writing – Page 18 – frustratedboomers

You And Me Against The World

I wrote this column three years ago … tomorrow, it will be 24 years since Mary Theresa Donovan left me the lone survivor of my crazy little nuclear family.

I’ve done a little editing, and added and removed some pictures.

I wish I could say that time heals all wounds. I know from experience that time softens the corners, but losing those you loved changes you, makes you different. A little more appreciative, perhaps, of those that remain, but always, always, vulnerable to those things that remind you of your loss. Some silly memories will make you smile; others will fill your eyes with tears.

I could, and probably should, write a book about her life, with it’s ups and downs, and the gallant courage she always showed. I am grateful for having had her as my mother.

******

It’s been 24 years since I lost my mum, and still there are days when I think, “Oh, I must tell Mum! She’d get such a kick out of hearing about that!” Then I remember that she’s gone, and it hurts all over again.

But I am lucky. I had a terrific mother, who was funny and smart and strong and she loved me, despite my failings. Even when I was at my most hateful, a rebel without a clue, Mum encouraged me and found the good in my mutinous soul.

My mother was just always there, usually chasing after me. I wasn’t a clingy kid. You’d more likely find me way up at the top of a tree, or posing beside the mannequins on a revolving display stand, than hanging off her skirt. I was the kind of kid that kiddy leashes were made for; darting madly into crowds, racing towards excitement. I wasn’t a brat – that would not have been tolerated – but I wasn’t easy.

My sister Jodi and I got into scrapes all the time. Once, we thought it would be lovely to bring home lilacs for Mum. So we helped ourselves to armfuls of the flowers, oblivious to the fact that they belonged to a private school. When the caretaker spotted us and started yelling, we ran, with the flowers leaving a trail of petals behind us, up the street and up the stairs of our apartment building. Thrusting the shredded lilacs into my mum’s arms I said, “Hide us! He’s coming!”

How she kept a straight face when the caretaker arrived, having followed the trail right to our door, I’ll never know. As he ranted and raved about the desecration of the school’s trees, she calmly told him that her girls couldn’t have done it; they’d been home and in their rooms all night. Of course, we were scolded later, but also warned that, if we were going to pursue a life of crime, it might be an idea to hide our getaway route a little better.

Jodi developed juvenile diabetes at 12. Always frail, she now became angry at the world. Heading into her teenage years with the stigma of twice daily injections and a restricted diet, she seethed with rage, flailing out at the rest of us for being healthy. My mum was a tower of strength, keeping her in line with love and laughter. Jodi and I thrived on Mum’s ability to put a funny spin on even the worst tragedies. Our humor was dark at times, but there was always laughter, and always music.

I left Montreal in 1976, and within a year, both Jodi and Mum joined me in Toronto. For a while, we all lived in the same apartment building at 100 Roehampton, just floors apart, and when my Grandmother and Aunt Pat moved to Toronto as well, they took an apartment in the building behind ours. Our strength came not just from laughter, but from proximity.

When I was singing full time, Mum couldn’t have been more supportive. She wouldn’t let me lift a finger in the house, lest I break a nail, or be too tired to perform that night. She lived through the joy and heartbreak of my first two marriages, the birth of my daughter Cara, and later, Cara’s son Carter, and never passed judgment on the way I chose to live my life.

After suffering a double stroke that left her partially paralyzed, she fought to re-learn how to walk, and eventually was able to triumphantly show me her first baby steps. When my sister died, Mum and I were devastated, and it was only through sharing each other’s strength that we were able to carry on. And still we laughed, and joked, sometimes through our tears.

My friends adored my mother, and loved to spend time with her. We’d have regular Rummoli nights, where she’d display her cutthroat gambling techniques, wiping out her opponents and winning all the pennies we used as chips. Mum drew people to her, and her friends spanned all age groups. No one was immune to her charms.

Mum adored Christmas. She would transform our humble home into a winter wonderland, with her collection of heirloom and newfound ornaments. She’d make sure anyone who dropped by was treated to a holiday they would never forget, and always had a few small presents tucked away so that no one was empty handed when the gifts were unwrapped. After her stroke, she was unable to decorate with her previous flair, but we compromised with a tiny artificial tree and a selection of her favorite foods to enjoy on Christmas Eve. Christmas Day, she would spend with Aunt Pat and Gram.(Me, Gram, Mum, Cara in front)

My grandmother, bless her, died on April Fools day, in 1992, and my mother finally gave up her own struggle 8 days later. I had just come home from bartending, about 3 a.m., when two policemen arrived at the door. Apparently they had been given the wrong phone number, and had been unable to reach me earlier. They told me that mum had had another stroke, and a heart attack, and was in critical condition. I cabbed it to Sunnybrooke. She was on the operating table, but they let me in for a moment to see her. As I stroked her hair, and assured her that I was there, she murmured, “don’t let them bring me back, I can’t face it again.”

As horrible as that was to hear, I understood. Going through rehab had nearly broken her spirit, and even those tiny steps relearnt had strained her. I told the doctors what she had said, but they were adamant that she was too young and would be strong enough to make it through.

I was brought to a waiting room, where I pulled out the book I had in my purse. Ironically, it was an Ashleigh Brilliant book of funny sayings and drawings, called “I May Not Be Totally Perfect, But Parts of Me Are Excellent.” I had bought it for Mum, but I paged through it, to relieve the tension, and find a laugh as I tried to send healing thoughts to her.

Although the door and windows were closed, I suddenly felt a soft breeze against my cheek. Tears rolled down my face, but I smiled, and said, “Bye, Mum.” A few moments later, a doctor entered the room to tell me that she had died, but I already knew that she was gone. She was only 64 years old.

A lot of odd things happened in the days following her death. Music boxes would start to play; strange, mystical items would suddenly appear. My aunts told me of dreams they had had about her, laughing and dancing, a young carefree girl once again. I knew she was somehow letting me know that all was well, and that I mustn’t let my grief consume me. She was wise and wonderful that way. (Aunt Anne, Mum, Aunt Pat and Gram)

All these years later, I still miss her. Despite being a mother and grandmother myself, I will always be Terry’s little girl in my heart. And I too will always remember her laughing and dancing. Her indomitable spirit gave me the strength and courage to reach for the stars, for even if I failed, she’d always be there to help me up again. And that’s really all a child can ask for in a mother.

= RT =

(first published Mother’s Day, 2013) https://bobsegarini.wordpress.com/2013/05/12/roxanne-tellier-you-and-me-against-the-world/)

Loving The Sharing Economy

Times are tough. Wages are stagnant, but costs keep rising. It’s getting harder and harder for the average Joe or Jane to get from one pay cheque to the next, and that’s assuming they’re even lucky enough to have a job. Students skip meals to buy books. If you’re in the arts, making ends meet is nearly impossible … and that’s before you hit your Golden Years.

Yep, all ages are feeling the pinch. For many, it’s the first time they’ve ever felt the bite on their bucks this savagely, so they’re under equipped to take advantage of some of the newest survival techniques out there. Time to use every trick you can find.

But how?

When Uber came along, it seemed a great way to make a couple of bucks, if you had a halfway decent vehicle. But many cities put up a good fight against ‘ride sharing,’ worried that it would cut into the taxi business, a rich tax resource, and strictly regulated.

The same thinking applied to Air BnB, and the renting out of space. Once governments realized they were losing hotel tax dollars to those entrepreneurs, regulations increased, and tourism taxes were applied.

In both cases, what seemed like a good way to make a few extra bucks, turned out to be primarily profitable for the owners of Uber and Air BnB. They reap the big bucks, while the entrepreneur incurs all the costs and risks.

There may not be many legit or magical ways to make extra money.

But there are ways to pinch a penny, if you’re open to new concepts. Charity shops are a mixed bag these days. Value Village is no longer such a value, and the Salvation Army and Goodwill are slowly increasing prices.

I do like the Kind Exchange, though items vary from location to location. (oh, and you can sell your gently used clothing to them, as well!)

But why bother, when I can pick up brand new clothing for less, and usually do, at outlets like Ardene, where prices are generally 70% off on clothing, and ridiculously low on shoes, jewellery, and other girly delights.

Three pair of flats for $10? Three new summer tank tops or new leggings for $15? I’m in! You can pop into one of their outlet shops, (I like the one at Woodside Square,) or even shop for their deals online at http://www.ardene.com/en/clothing.html .

That’s just one chain – there are many more that have crazy clearances and outlets. Google ‘outlet’ and you may be surprised at how easy it is to get your cut-price shopping on.

Or let’s say you want something that’s ‘new to you,’ but the only thing you’re rich in is dreams. You might want to try a Bunz group. My grandson told me about this barter group last year, but I finally found them on Facebook a few weeks ago. These are usually private groups that you’ll have to ask to join.

Toronto’s Emily Bitze started the Bunz Trading Zone (BTZ) (originally called Bumz) in 2013. It’s a swap/trade group that operates on a no money basis. The ‘currency’ can be anything from TTC tokens to beer cans. You offer anything from clothes to furniture, advice or services, and negotiate your own deal.

Another intriguing way to stretch a buck is with the Toronto Tool Library , also on Facebook. For $50 a year, you have access to over 4,000 tools, ranging from electronics to carpentry and everything in between. They also have a Makerspace with 3D printers, lasercutter & full wood shop. It’s a great way to start or indulge in your hobbies without a fortune in outlay.

I’ve been an avid user of Freecycle (www.freecycle.org) since it first appeared, about a decade ago. “The Freecycle Network™ is made up of 5,285 groups with 9,182,159 members around the world. It’s a grassroots and entirely nonprofit movement of people who are giving (and getting) stuff for free in their own towns. It’s all about reuse and keeping good stuff out of landfills. Each local group is moderated by local volunteers (them’s good people). Membership is free.”

You give, and you get. As a member of several groups (you can join as many as make sense to your location) and the moderator of one, I’ve seen everything from food to clothing to furniture, professional equipment, and oddities be offered. I’ve even seen cars, trailers, and once – a boat! – be recycled. It’s a terrific way to spring clean or downsize, while giving to those who have a need, and feeling great about keeping perfectly good items out of landfills.

There are no strings attached, which instills a sense of generosity of spirit. Similar groups have sprung up as well, usually specific to geographical areas, that operate in the same manner. Google FreeTOreuse, or Trash Nothing! for instructions on how to join those groups.

Most of the freecycling groups will offer some basic rules and cautions. I’ve had little problem with either the items I’ve offered, or the items I’ve collected, but you want to use some basic common sense when interacting with people you don’t know. The majority of freecyclers prefer to leave or pickup items from door steps or porches.

So now that you’ve got your basic material needs covered, you need somewhere to keep your stuff.

Community living is quickly becoming an affordable way to share space and costs. Once standard amongst students and musicians, the crazy price of real estate has brought back the practice for all who cannot or will not pay sky high rents. It’s also a great way to sample an area, without committing to long term leases. You can find Facebook groups that list sublets and temporary living spaces in your area, or somewhere you’d like to be.

For those with champagne tastes and beer budgets, sharing a living space can mean a major lifestyle upgrade – if you can handle your roommates’ personalities. A group of twenty-somethings with like tastes can rent a great space, if they’re pooling their cash. Shared living opens up possibilities that might not have been in the budget for a single renter.

I’ve been talking about a ‘rock and roll retirement home’ for years. It only makes sense for those in similar fields and with similar backgrounds to pool resources in a way that allows freer expression than that most commonly seen in retirement homes. I’m just hoping I can get it off the ground before it’s time to move in!

It’s possible to live fairly well on a limited budget, if you are open to changing hard-wired views and beliefs. The market has spent billions convincing buyers to spend. But you don’t have to buy what they’re selling. There’s a whole new world of possibilities within the sharing economy.

Honouring Life

It is so very easy to get caught up in getting from day to day. There are always bills to pay, mouths to feed, people who need your attention … and then there’s the silly things, the diversions that gobble up the time we call spare.

I am a dreamer. I want love and beauty and peace and happiness around me. Cocooning in books, music and film could consume all of my time, if not for the ‘have to’s,’ and the ‘should do’s.’ Eking out moments to do the ‘want to’s’ gets harder when I’m feeling guilty that I’m not living up to other people’s expectations.

But the sad truth is that life goes on, with or without my enjoyment or participation. The clock keeps ticking, and the days on the calendar keep moving forward, even If I’m not doing the things I would rather do. Some weeks it seems like I wake up on Monday, and go to sleep on Saturday, having neither seen nor felt much in between. When I flip through my appointment books for 2013, 2014 and 2015, I can see at a glance that I’ve done very little to achieve the things I had planned. Will 2016’s calendar look any different?

Where did all of that time go? It went to housework and make work, appointments and meetings, cooking and cleaning up afterwards. It went on necessary trips to the grocery, and unnecessary hours of playing computer mah-jong. What it didn’t go towards were enough hours spent communicating, by phone, in person or by computer, with those I cherish.

One of my dearest friends died from cancer, two years ago. It was a long illness, fraught with surgery and chemo, but she always believed that she could beat the disease. Still, she made sure to spend what time she had in doing what she’d put off for years; spending time with loved ones, traveling, taking courses, and enjoying live entertainment. What she stopped doing was living up to other people’s expectations.

I never had the guts to ask her if she had any regrets. I hope she didn’t have any, by the time she finally passed. But, through my own denial and in not wanting to crush her optimism, I missed a chance to ask a question she might have wanted to answer. And now I’ll never know.

One day I will not wake up. Like the sands in an hourglass, my time will have sifted away. Whatever I meant to accomplish in my trip from birth to death will be moot; only what I’ve actually done will be of consequence.

Since I can’t know what day or year that will be, I can only try to make each day count, in whatever way I choose to honour this brief life.

Peter Cottontail Has Left the Building

This week, leading up to Good Friday and Easter Sunday, has always been considered the Holiest of Holy weeks to Catholics. As a child, I looked forward to new shoes and a showy hat (women still had to wear them in church, back then) and a basketful of goodies – maybe even a chocolate bunny!

But that was then, and this is now, and it’s been a long time since anyone’s hunted for coloured eggs at my house. Peter Cottontail has left the building, and this week was a horror show all around, with bombings in Brussels, the ramping up of panic in America over both terrorism and Trump’s continued putsch to glory, interspersed with freezing rain, a dismal outcome (for many) to the Jian Ghomeshi trial, a Liberal budget that projects a $30 billion deficit, and a surprisingly negative response to the new Batman vs Superman movie. Oh, and the beer and liquor stores were closed for two days.

And you can add to that the shock accompanying hearing of the death of comedian Gary Shandling. At 66, he was far too young, and we were not ready for his genius to leave us.

You will forgive me if this has been a week I’d prefer to forget.

The loss of another celebrity, former Mayor Rob Ford, also captured attention. I’ve written about him before, and my feelings about his tenure remain unchanged. So do the feelings of those who admired him. However, Torontonians who dared to pen anything more than a non-committal noting of his passing were soundly excoriated by their fellow citizens for not prostrating at his bier with enough respect.

The world press had no such strictures.

Some people will try to convince you that their way to mourn is the only and correct way. I disagree. There is no ‘right way” to mourn, and demanding fealty at the point of a disapproving moral gun does not change the past. You would think that the unprecedented two day period of lying in state at City Hall (at the request of the family) would appease the bereaved, but apparently, that is not enough. Those who revered his blustering, bumbling ways would have us re-write history, in an effort to whitewash his misdeeds, and beatify him as Toronto’s savior.

It’s all so very reminiscent of the post-death canonization of Margaret Thatcher. Reviled during her tenure for her hawkish policies, key role in bringing about the first Gulf War, and advocating for the 2003 attack on Iraq, along with her ushering in of a period where the rich got richer at the expense of the poor, her influence negatively affected millions around the world. And yet, her canonization began just nanoseconds after word of her death hit the airwaves; she was lionized worldwide in the press, her state funeral cost Britain £3.1 million pounds, and Iron Lady statues made of actual iron were erected in places as diverse as the Falkland Islands , despite Argentina’s fury.

Meanwhile, the song “Ding Dong the Witch is Dead” raced to the top of the British charts.

There’s a price to be paid for assuming a position of power – the admission includes having your life and history scrutinized and deemed worthy or unworthy, both by those who liked you and by those who didn’t, who still had to live with the impact of political actions. It is ‘misapplied death etiquette,’ as journalist Glenn Greenwald wrote, to be expected to apply the same moral high ground we do to the deaths of private individuals as we do when considering the entirety of the life of an influential public figure.

“There’s something distinctively creepy – in a Roman sort of way – about this mandated ritual that our political leaders must be heralded and consecrated as saints upon death. This is accomplished by this baseless moral precept that it is gauche or worse to balance the gushing praise for them upon death with valid criticisms. There is absolutely nothing wrong with loathing Margaret Thatcher or any other person with political influence and power based upon perceived bad acts, and that doesn’t change simply because they die. If anything, it becomes more compelling to commemorate those bad acts upon death as the only antidote against a society erecting a false and jingoistically self-serving history.”

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/apr/08/margaret-thatcher-death-etiquette

Ah, but the self-anointed social media judges and lawyers would disagree.

A video capturing an incident involving a young woman, confronted with parking in a handicapped space, went viral this week. Shot here in Toronto, in front of a Tim Hortons, the video showed her reaction to being caught – privileged outrage, threats, and the throwing of two cups of coffee at the videographer.

Surprisingly, many were more incensed by the videographer’s capture and sharing of the incident, than at the belligerent aggression of the scofflaw. Despite assaulting the photographer, and driving off in a huff, aiming her vehicle at the cameraman before swerving away, these commentators believed she should not have been confronted, but rather, that the photographer should have ‘minded his own business.’

As the video went viral, international viewers were stunned to see her rudeness … aren’t all Canadians pretty much nice and polite people, they asked? No, some, with possibly the best of intentions, are bullies.

Bullying in an attempt to force your morality, or personal and world views, onto others, is still bullying. I have one ex-Facebook friend who blocked my posts because her nephews follow her page, and she censors what they can see. Another Facebooker resented my questioning the morality of the actions of Israel towards Palestine, despite my information having come from a Jewish peace activist living in Israel.

And the culmination of the trial of Jian Ghomeshi unleashed some of the vilest comments I’ve ever seen directed at alleged victims of assault. The women were ‘liars,’ ‘manipulative,’ ‘shameful fame seekers,’ ‘femitards,’ ‘toxic bitches,’ and worse. Despite the fact that a total of 21 women had originally come forward to complain, with identical accusations, about Ghomeshi’s weird ideas on sex play, only three were brave enough to appear in court, and all three were pummeled with relentless demands to answer questions about, not just the attack, but trivial events of a decade past – what lawyers like to call ‘whacking’ – while Ghomeshi sat silent. (ghomeshi cosby.jpg)

The judge’s decision acquitted Ghomeshi, but also noted that his verdict did not mean these events ‘never happened.’ The judge simply didn’t believe the women’s testimony, flawed as it was by misremembered events, private messages between two of the accusers, and contact with the accused after the fact.

For women of every political stripe, the decision was flawed, and the system biased. At City Hall, one naked protester was unnecessarily and roughly tackled to the ground, her nipples scraping the pavement as she was dragged away by the police. Despite nudity being legal in Canada, the uptight citizens must not be discomfited by the sight of a woman’s breasts.

From a story released by the CBC: “While former CBC Radio host Jian Ghomeshi’s acquittal has sparked protests, many within the legal community are praising the decision, agreeing with the judge that the complainants’ credibility issues raised reasonable doubt in the case.”

By implication, stating that “many within the legal community” support the decision, dismisses by extension those who found the decision as to be ill-informed. In actual fact, many of those who have criticized the decision are academic and legal scholars.

Am I biased? Perhaps. Or is the system itself flawed? At the beginning of the month, a report filed by the Criminal Lawyer’s Association found that women were leaving the field of criminal law in dramatically high numbers, due to systemic discrimination.

“It found low pay, lack of financial support for maternity leave and being treated differently than male peers by judges and court staff as some of the reasons so many women are leaving private practice of criminal law,” reported Maureen Brosnahan for the CBC. “Many women also reported a lack of respect and being treated differently than male lawyers by court officers, police, crown attorneys and judges. One reported being called “little lady” repeatedly. Others said they were chastised for asking judges for time to pick up children from school whereas their male counterparts who made similar requests were not rebuked.”

Whether or not it is possible to change how sensitive cases are handled in an atmosphere where women are routinely marginalized, it’s still time for an honest reappraisal of how sexual assault cases are conducted in Canada, especially in the face of the numbers.

“In Canada, the low rates of conviction for sexual assault are an indictment of the system itself. As a 2014 Toronto Star article revealed using Statscan data from 2004 and 2006, 460,000 women self-reported sexual assault: 15,200 reported to the police, 5,544 charges were laid, with 2,824 prosecutions and 1,519 convictions. Again, that’s almost a half million self-reported assaults, and 1,519 convictions. Something is deeply wrong.”

Understandably – and not because we are stupid or legally naive, but because 1 in 4 women has experienced a sexual assault in her lifetime, and has a strong personal stake in how this case concluded – many women were incensed at the Ghomeshi decision.

Enter ‘mansplaining.’

Either unable or unwilling to see how angry and hurt many women are by the Ghomeshi decision, mansplainers flocked to the posts women made about their feelings on the ruling. “Read the decision,” they intoned, as though we were either too stupid to understand, or blind to the many gloatings of those who’d ‘called it’ from the beginning, and who were dancing in joy at both the decision and having been proved right.

Hey! Your side won! Now could you take your foot off my neck so that I can sympathize and empathize with women who feel as I do, stunned at the inevitability of once again, being re-victimized post-assault?

Are you so utterly deaf to the agony of people in pain that your only recourse is to repeat incessantly that ‘justice has been done?’

Or as one woman keened in her blog, “How can you be so blind? How can you insert yourself into a woman pouring her grief out, to tell her that legally, she has no case? That what happened to her, didn’t factually happen. To throw a smothering blanket on the fire igniting in her. She has no reality. The law is the reality. It is the neutral, the official record. It is gas lighting on a massive scale.

So I know perhaps the evidence wasn’t there, or that the burden of proof wasn’t met. And I don’t fucking care. This isn’t about this one case. This case was inevitable, like watching a lemming marching to its doom.

It’s every fucking time. Every time. The mundanity of the oppression, the predictability of the reaction, the backlash that follows. “ (https://afateofpossibilities.wordpress.com/2016/03/25/this-isnt-about-the-ghomeshi-case/)

It is indeed gaslighting. It’s telling people that their emotions are invalid, that what they see and feel has no weight. It’s a way to keep those who disagree with you off balance, wondering if perhaps what they perceive isn’t real, casting doubt on their mental stability, pointing to others that agree with YOUR beliefs as proof that THEY are in the wrong. It is psychological abuse. And it’s an ugly way to treat anyone.

The overwhelming miasma of this week – at least for me – has been one of outraged, self-righteous, phony, morality gone mad, and overwhelmingly imposed upon all in its path. Think as I think, believe as I believe, abandon your own truths and take on mine.

Whether it be Trump calling the beleaguered city of Brussels ‘a hellhole,’ or Cruz demanding strict policing of American Muslims in their own neighbourhoods; police manhandling protestors, or judges calling women deceitful and self-serving, it’s not been a good week to have a high Emotional I.Q., and a low tolerance for sanctimonious public principles forced upon the social order by the court of public opinion.

(first published March 27/16 (bobsegarini.wordpress.com/2016/03/27/roxanne-tellier-peter-cottontail-has-left-the-building)

Interesting Times

“May you live in interesting times.” Not a blessing, some say, but a curse, as though only times of peace and contentment are to be appreciated and enjoyed.

Perhaps we mean it ironically, as all times, across all eras, have had interesting aspects. Specific conditions change, but people still bend or break in reaction. Those who lived through the Great Depression, World Wars, Kennedy’s assassination, the Age of Aquarius, and the onset of the Computer Age, came out the other end either subtly or grossly altered. And those who look back fondly at rosy tinted times are prisoners of nostalgia, blinded by imaginings that neatly snip out the bits that disturb the dream.

So many dread and fear changes to their lives, and yet, there can be great beauty in chaos. Certainly, coping with new information can be problematic, but without profound change, we are static and boring. We even bore ourselves when life becomes nothing more than a forced march through our days, stuck deep in a rut of habit and preconceptions. Creativity demands a spur. You cannot rage against that with which you have not grappled.

We can try to hide away when change threatens our equilibrium. Or we can rush toward change, willing to embrace whatever life throws at us. Either way, change will come. The only difference will be in how you accept the inevitable. Will you accommodate the newness, incorporating what is different, and weaving its strands into your existence? Or will you rail impotently at what is to come, in a foolish attempt to cling to the past, to slow down what cannot be stopped? The present doesn’t care. The present continually dances to each new reality, with or without your approval.

The refusal to embrace change has reached its zenith in American politics. Long groomed by the Religious Right and a lockstep Republican party‘s fanatical refusal and repudiation of science and actual facts, a good part of the nation now stumbles along behind the Godzilla of Gaslighting, a man so devoid of empathy for his fellow man (or woman) that he feels free to tar whole segments of humanity with his own prejudices and biases. A textbook narcissist, willing to say or do anything to stay in the spotlight, and keep a constant stream of attention upon his silly self, he manipulates his followers through their nostalgic yearning for happier times … Make America Great Again, he cries, as though only he has Willie Wonka’s golden ticket to the future. The future he’s selling, though, seems to have to first detour through the past.

He wants to return America to the “good old days,” when life was simple. Well, simple for a certain segment of society, before civil rights and equal rights. Not so good, and a giant step backwards, for women, people of colour, or immigrants, be they legal or illegal.

His followers yearn for an America that never existed except on film. They are led not so much by what he says, but what they fear – reality itself. They want to stop the world, just for a while, “just until we figure out what’s going on.” He’s going to make life all better, more understandable, and “you’re gonna love it. There will be so much winning, you’ll get sick of winning.”

Like a slimy, used car salesman , the Sultan of Slurs seduces with words of no more than three syllables, absolutely devoid of facts or actual plans, and replete with self-aggrandizement. “I will tell you this, and I can say it with certainty: I will be the greatest jobs producing President that God ever created. I love the subject, I love doing it, and I love helping people.”

Despite zero political experience, and a chequered, peppered with bankruptcy, past, he has nonetheless captured the lazy and the selfish, those who have yet to grasp that they are being sold a bill of goods. It seems almost preordained – behold your next President, brought to you by a media that prizes sound bites over content, the election reduced to a simple transaction between a seller and a buyer. And bought by those too foolish to grasp the precept, “if it seems too good to be true, it probably is.”

Meanwhile, politicians with actual platforms run smack into that same unwillingness to grasp change, or hope for the future. After declaring in Ohio that her coal plan would “put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business,” Hillary Clinton, with almost terminal foot in mouth disease, was soundly booed and condemned by coal country lawmakers. Meanwhile, the $30 billion alternative being offered for investment in the clean-energy economy was completely dismissed. Because, yes, there will be more jobs in clean energy, but for those who’ve spent a lifetime in coal mining, it’s a leap too far, particularly for people with little confidence in current government And especially since, as former Representative Barney Frank put it, “the likelihood that 58-year-old coal miners are going to become the solar engineers of the future is nil.”

That guy is more likely to be thinking, “if Black Lung and lung cancer were good enough for my dad … they’re good enough for me.”

Despair. Fear. Anger. So much anger. Anger that simmers just below the surface, until released in the form of the fist of a 78-year old man, sucker punching a young, black dissenter. A mindless, impotent, unending anger against politicians, Wall Street, terrorists, immigrants snatching the few remaining jobs, governments kinder to corporations than its voting citizens. Anger against a dream denied, a life that might have been, a life ‘as seen on TV.’ An anger that is fear disguised as action and reaction.

“This is an extraordinary time full of vital, transformative movements that could not be foreseen. It’s also a nightmarish time. Full engagement requires the ability to perceive both.” Rebecca Solnit

The stories that are told to us, and the stories we tell ourselves, about our pasts, our presents, and our possible futures, reflect only one aspect at a time. If the narrator chooses to emphasize the negative over the positive, our emotions can be twisted, causing us to accept or reject the narrative. It’s often very much in how you look at things that determines how the experience ends.

This same society, this same world, which can be perceived as cold and unforgiving, can also be a place of wonder and delight. Each step forward, plagued as it can be by those who resent change, represents shifts in ideas and perspectives. Social change is happening. The very framework of how we view sexuality is shifting. There are progressive advances in the sciences that we would never have anticipated, even months ago. All of these marvels are going on in real time, minute by minute. But if your expectations are shaped by those who desperately cling to the past, you’ll be stuck back there with them. If all you are focused on is what is temporarily amusing, or that which jibes with your own, delicate, beliefs, you’ll blink and miss glimpses of your future.

We have little control over the times in which we live. Indeed, no one has total control of anything, or anyone, other than themselves, and even that doesn’t always run smooth. So you may as well surrender to uncertainty. When we are willing to step into the unknown, free from all preconceptions, those ‘interesting times’ become the opening notes to a symphony of possibilities.

(first pubished March 20/16: bobsegarini.wordpress.com/2016/03/20/roxanne-tellier-interesting-times/)

No Sleep Til Brooklyn …

When I mentioned that I was going for a sleep apnea test a while back, I was surprised at how many people I knew that had already undergone the polysomnogram. Was this an aging thing, something that happens as our bodies rebel against all the indignities we’ve put them through?

Time for a PSA! Here’s what you need to know …

Sleep apnea is a disorder that anyone can experience, even little kids. But it’s more likely to happen if you’re male, over 40, overweight, and have a family history. It’s also common in those who suffer from gastric reflux, or who have a history of allergies, sinus problems, a deviated septum, large tonsils, a large tongue, or a small jaw bone. Having a larger neck (17 inches or greater in men and 16 inches or greater in women) may indicate problems as well.

Basically, apnea is when you stop breathing, or have difficulty breathing. Naturally, this can create problems, since your brain would prefer you breathe at all times. And there are two kinds of sleep apnea – one involves a blockage of the airway, when the soft tissue (that big tongue or tonsils) collapses at the back while you sleep, and the other kind, which is when your brain fails to signal the muscles to breathe, due to instability in the respiratory control center. If you snore, you may have experienced the same sort of temporary breathing cessation.

Beyond that pesky “needing to breathe to live” thing, problems with sleep of any kind can lead to everything from headaches, and being distracted at work and school, to depression, high blood pressure, diabetes, stroke and heart failure. Oh yeah, and to top it off, poor sleep makes you more likely to be overweight. So really, this is something you don’t want to ignore.

On the day that I was to take the test, I was told to abstain from caffeinated or alcoholic drinks, but to otherwise eat as normal, and report to the clinic for 8pm with my jammies. And so, one cold and snowy night, me and my footie pyjamas were ushered into what looked like a budget motel room, where I filled in numerous forms and was then weighed and measured, before being hooked up to the machine that doesn’t go ‘ping!’

Here’s what happens next: “About two dozen sensors are applied to the skin of your head and body with a mild adhesive. These small metal discs are called electrodes. They are connected to a computer and record the vital signs of your sleep. The wires are long enough to let you move around and turn over in bed. Flexible elastic belts around your chest and abdomen measure your breathing. A clip on your finger or earlobe monitors your heart rate and the level of oxygen in your blood. None of these devices are painful. They are all designed to be as comfortable as possible. The sensors may feel strange on your skin at first. But most people get used to them very quickly. They should not be an obstacle that keeps you from falling asleep. After everything is hooked up, you will do a test to make sure it is all in working order. You will be asked to move your eyes, clench your teeth and move your legs. Once it is all ready, you are free to read or watch TV until your normal bedtime. Then the lights are turned out and it is time for you to go to sleep.”

Yes, it’s a tad intrusive. But I’m game. So in a fairly short time, I fell asleep. Between the electrodes, the strangeness of the room, and the howling winter winds bouncing off the building like sonic booms, I’d guesstimate I got about 4 hours sleep total. I’ve never been so glad to get up and go home at 6 a.m. in my life.

And then, you wait. “The analysis of a sleep study is a complex and time-consuming process. A typical sleep study produces about 1,000 pages of data. This information includes things such as brain waves, eye movements, and breathing patterns. It requires hours of work from a trained professional to accurately analyze the results. A sleep technologist processes or “scores” all of this data. A sleep study is not something that you pass or fail. The scored results are simply given to a doctor for further evaluation. At an accredited center, this doctor must be a board-certified sleep specialist. The doctor will review the study to find out what kind of sleep problem you may have. Because of the detail and amount of time involved, it usually takes about two weeks for you to get the results. The doctor who ordered the study will discuss the results with you. If your primary care doctor ordered it, then the results are sent to him or her. If you met with a doctor in the sleep center, then he or she will tell you the results.”

So it was about a month later that I heard from the sleep centre. Both my husband and I were fairly certain that I hadn’t a problem, but since we lack those twelve plus years of actual med school, thought we’d defer to a professional’s better judgment.

As it turns out, I do have a mild case, along with some moderate snoring. It could easily be relieved by stopping smoking, dropping ten pounds, and getting some exercise now and again. However, if I chose not to clean up my act, or if my particular apnea had been more severe, I would have been advised to first test drive, and then purchase, a machine called a CPAP.

This is a mask that will either cover your nose or your nose and mouth. Another version has soft silicone tubes, called nasal pillows, which fit directly in your nostrils, and provide a steady stream of air that gently blows into the back of your throat. This treatment is called positive airway pressure (PAP). While there are three kinds of PAP, the most common uses a level of pressure that remains continuous (CPAP.) In Canada, Health Insurance subsidizes a percentage of the cost, but, depending on the model you choose to buy, you’re looking at shelling out somewhere between $200 and $1000.

(Apparently there’s a thriving ‘black market’ for ‘gently used’ CPAP masks on Craigslist and Kijiji as well … though some might find it a little spooky to buy grandma’s old hand-me-down contraption.)

Bottom line, sleep is important for everyone. Getting older often means accepting certain health problems, but sleep disturbance should not be one of them – the brain and body simply cannot function properly and efficiently without being refreshed nightly.

So if your doctor wants you to have a sleep study, go for it. Worse than can happen is that you’ll lose a few hours of rest in your own lumpy bed. Best case scenario might mean a vast improvement in your health and overall enjoyment of life.

And that concludes our Public Service Announcement.

At the sound of the tone, you may go back to your regularly scheduled activities … ping!

It Is To Laugh!

In a Salon.com article last week, Steve Almond accused Comedy Central of having “squandered Jon Stewart’s legacy” by appointing South African comedian Trevor Noah as host, over the then-incumbent Samantha Bee.

The author points to the success of Bee’s new show “Full Frontal” as proof that Noah’s lower key, outsider’s perspective, has damaged the credibility and political power of The Daily Show.

There’s so much wrong with that attitude that I barely know where to begin. Full disclosure: my conversion to political junkie is relatively recent, and as with most converts, I just can’t get enough of meaningful discussion on my new passion. I’m also an entertainer who studied comedy and acting for long enough to have a dispassionate overview of what I see on the screen – I’m not buying the physical over the intellectual. I watch for knowledge and to hear something clever that I hadn’t thought of myself.

That being said – there’s lots of leg room in the television/Internet world for a wide spectrum of opinions, and lawdy, lawdy, there’s a fan for every fanatical opinion. I dislike certain types of discourse; insightful commentary has no need to use scatology or childish insults unless justified in context. Those that shriek their thoughts are right off my list of viewing. So, that certainly leaves out the FOX News Network, and all Republican debates, no matter how ‘entertaining.’

But let’s just cut to the chase on why Samantha Bee declined the chance to succeed Jon Stewart.

“I like how Vanity Fair leaned into the 50’s sexism of late night by making the photo Mad Men-themed’.“

The ‘titans of late night’ sausagefest included Stephen Colbert, Conan O’Brien, James Corden, Jimmy Kimmel, John Oliver, Seth Meyers, Jimmy Fallon, and token light skinned Trevor Noah and Larry Wilmore. Not exactly a cultural mosaic going on there.

“What’s conspicuously missing from late-night, still, is women,’ wrote David Kamp.’How gobsmackingly insane is it that no TV network has had the common sense — and that’s all we’re talking about in 2015, not courage, bravery, or even decency — to hand over the reins of an existing late-night comedy program to a female person?‘

(You could also add “people of colour” there, but I’ll get to that in a minute.)

While I can appreciate the work of Conan O’Brien, James Corden, Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers, and Jimmy Fallon, I’ve never really taken to them. I’m just ‘over’ the late night formula, with its emphasis on rising or fading stars, and middle of the road, slightly risqué, rarely challenging patter. That was always the domain of older, white males, and still largely is. That’s more ” falling asleep in front of the TV” stuff, to me.

Stephen Colbert’s defection to The Tonight Show, despite his best efforts, still landed him in that traditional format. While the move made great career sense overall and I do love his joyful, melodica playing, bandleader, Jon Batiste, Colbert’s brilliance is still best viewed in his political snipes, and thankfully, the cream of his wit usually wind up getting spun off into Internet clips and memes.

Trevor Noah only has to step on stage for the conservative dog whistles to start – he’s a young, black, South African, and an immigrant who’s taken an American’s job! A gentle, soft spoken and thoughtful soul, he is able to laugh at his own foibles and to marvel at American customs and culture. I find his often wide-eyed wonder refreshing – I too sometimes feel the same gulf between how Canadians and Americans think. Sometimes it’s just too wide a mental leap to span.

The contrast between the often brash, broad humoured and ultra-white Stewart and Noah’s more restrained presence can be jarring, if all you are looking for is what you’ve already seen. But Stewart himself knew that it was time to go – he’d accomplished what he’d set out to do. He saw that it was time to move on and let the next wave of young comedians have their shot. He subsequently signed a four year production contract with HBO, while continuing as executive producer of …

The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore – an Afrocentric look at America’s politics. Maybe it’s the humour of the damned and the resigned, but it’s also intelligent, truthful, often wise, and empathic.

A typical, if bowdlerized, user’s comment on the show: “they have almost no white people on their show at any point, and often just disrespect that person. It’s always a black panel, it’s always the same guys opinion, who is him? I’ve never seen or heard of him. He presents rather, off humor, if any of this is humor, which it’s not, it’s just a group of people acting out raged constantly”

The main take-away being, at least on the commentator’s part, not to see a chance to explore and try to understand a different perspective on the very real problem of racism in America, and how it’s dealt with, legally and individually, but instead a demand for more white faces to rehash white opinions on a series focused on black lives. And there you have your #allLifeMatters in a nutshell.

Stewart was also instrumental in launching Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, a satirical look at news, politics and current events. Oliver had the distinction of guest-hosting The Daily Show in the summer of 2013, when Stewart took a working sabbatical to direct his film, Rosewater. Oliver’s sardonic and exaggerated comedic ‘voice,’ was immediately acceptable to American viewers familiar with the work of British comedians in the Monty Python vein. Although his series airs only once a week, each episode is a little gem, with the bulk of the airtime focusing with laser beam intensity on a well-researched and timely item deserving of closer examination.

Still a force to be reckoned with, is Bill Maher, of Real Time, and the late, lamented Politically Incorrect. The granddaddy of political satire and discussion, Maher is definitely polarizing. He’s a “love him or hate him” kinda guy. Perhaps that’s the attraction. At any rate, I’ve followed his career since the nineties, and even once seized the opportunity to be in the Politically Incorrect audience, just a week or two after 9/11. Though I can’t remember if that was the episode that got his multi –award winning show cancelled.

“ABC decided against renewing Maher’s contract for Politically Incorrect in 2002, after he made a controversial on-air remark six days after the September 11 attacks. He agreed with his guest, conservative pundit Dinesh D’Souza, that the 9/11 terrorists did not act in a cowardly manner (in rebuttal to President Bush’s statement calling them cowards). Maher said, “We have been the cowards. Lobbing cruise missiles from 2,000 miles away. That’s cowardly. Staying in the airplane when it hits the building. Say what you want about it. Not cowardly. You’re right.””

Maher barely skipped a beat, moving from ABC to HBO in 2003, where his hour-long political comedy talk show, Real Time with Bill Maher, has flourished ever since.

Bill and I have been aging disgracefully – a world apart, but akin in spirit – for decades. We’re both still lippy, lefty, liberals – though I disagree with his pro-gun stance – with a sarcastic attitude, and a hate-on for bad politics, bought off politicians and mass media, inane bureaucracy, and rabid religionists of any stripe. What’s not to love? I’m positively dejected when I miss my Friday night fix of Real Time .

But circling back to Full Frontal with Samantha Bee… this new series airs only once a week. Like John Oliver, Bee touches briefly on current events, before diving deep into the murky waters of American politics. She’s funny, strong, relevant, courageous … even the show’s theme song, Peaches “The Boys Wanna Be Her,” asserts that “the boys want to be her, the girls want to be her.”

And I think that rings true to a young, engaged, non gender discriminating audience. Bee is cocky, unafraid to confront the staid establishment. Her interview with Texas Republican representative Dan Flynn, about writing the anti-abortion restrictions despite knowing little about the procedure, is typical of her style. “I speak with the authority of one who has a uterus,” Bee tells him, “and I guess that’s why I think that you’re the wrongiest, wrongheadedest wrong person.”

She’s exciting, she’s brave – and she’s Canadian! All of which allows her to comment and opine on wrongheadedness from the perspective of a country more known for acceptance than intellectual resistance. But we’re only four episodes in so far. It may seem longer, since that has encompassed four weeks, but we’re talking baby steps here.

By contrast, Trevor Noah’s been at The Daily Show since September 28, 2015, appearing four nights a week most weeks. Viewers have had time to decide on whether they like his shtick or not. Or have they?

I recently watched an episode of Noah speaking with New York Mayor Bill de Blasio. But this time, the episode that I watched was not the regular, clipped for time, segment normally shown in the time spot, but rather, included the ‘extended’ interview that is available only to those who seek out the episode on Comedy Central. There was an entirely different tone between the televised and the ‘only available on the Internet’ conversation.

In the first, commercially aired segment, there was a lot of polite banter and civility. But just as the conversation got started, it was cut short.

De Blasio: And look, a lot of people don’t feel the government’s treating them fairly. For years and years, a lot of – and this is especially why, as you know, I’m very involved in the issue of addressing income inequality. And, you know, it’s amazing, you see the national discussion – like, why are people angry? Why are they frustrated? Because they’ve been screwed. Because for decades they’ve seen their incomes go down. They’ve seen their economic reality decline, and they wonder if their kids are going to have anywhere near as good a life as they had. Would you be content? The anger and frustration are the natural way people should feel when they go through that, and then they take that frustration out on a government that they feel has let them down.

Noah: That has let them down, especially when it comes to income inequality. It’s funny you bring that up, because you are big on income inequality, which seems like a Bernie Sanders supporter, and, yet, you’ve endorsed Hillary, which we’ll talk more about. TV time is up – we’ll be talking more on the web and on the app.

(the extended interview) http://www.thecomedynetwork.ca/Shows/TheDailyShow?vid=821779

Now, I can’t say that I’ve watched many of the extended interviews. However – a different Noah, a more confident, knowledgeable and willing to confront, Noah, appeared during the extended segment. And, in my opinion, that’s the Noah that viewers would prefer to the polished, safe, non-threatening, Noah they’ve been sold since his debut.

But really, in the end, our appreciation of comedy is personal, and only our opinion, as is our sense of humour. Everyone’s taste is different, and that’s a good thing – it speaks to our individuality. There’s room for all at the inn – pitting comedian against comedian is sophomoric and limiting. Let’s keep any nonsense austerity principles as far away from the distribution of art as we can.

Having a wide range of voices available for regular viewing is the essence of our freedom to choose, a real gift to viewers, and a paean to the right of free speech.

(first published Match 6/2015: bobsegarini.wordpress.com/2016/03/06/roxanne-tellier-it-is-to-laugh/)

But I don’t want to ‘spring forward!’

On Sunday, many of us will “spring forward,” where we will stay until the first Sunday of November, when we will “fall back.” That’s an awful lot of springing and falling, if you ask me, especially in a leap year.

I grew up with the concept of Daylight Saving Time, but I’ve never truly understood the idea. I remember being told some sort of story about farmers and crops and what sort of monster was I to think that my urban sense of time was more important than agriculture, and where do you think you’re going in that short skirt, young lady … oh, that might have been another conversation….

Anyway, yeah – saving daylight. Maybe it’s a war thing, like Saving Private Ryan. I’m sure I heard some story about munitions factories wanting to save on electricity during the war years, and I guess that makes a bit of sense, but really – aren’t most factories closed shops? Dependent on artificial light to see by, regardless of the time of day? So hang on – both of the reasons I remember being told for Daylight Saving hinge on some vague memory of what farms and factories looked like a hundred years ago?

This is all starting to seem rather silly and ‘make worky.’

I do enjoy a little more sun at the end of a long summer’s day, but I can’t really justify that odd bit of enjoyment while I deal with feeding pets that are notoriously bad at telling time. Their little tummies want to be fed on a schedule, and asking them to wait patiently for another hour ensures that it is ME who will be groggily trying to find my slippers, and then banging off the hallway walls trying to find the kitchen, an hour earlier.

And I fail to see how my running from room to room resetting clocks, thermostats, recording devices, microwaves, and stove clocks saves me any time at all.

Proponents say that the extra light prevents automobile accidents, but school bus accidents occur more frequently in the morning during DST. And in fact, there’s a huge spike in accidents of all kinds on the first Monday after the clocks move forward. It actually takes about five days for our brains to settle down after a time shift. There’s also a huge spike in heart attacks in the first week after the clocks go forward. Human bodies like schedules, and having schedules disrupted for no apparent reason is very stressful.

The whole thing’s a crock, first brought up in a Ben Franklin joke in 1770. People stopped laughing when an English builder named William Willet lobbied for the idea in 1907. In 1915, Germany adopted daylight saving, in an attempt to save energy, and in 1916, Britain followed suit. There was a war going on, so most of the allies, including Canada and the United States, jumped on the bandwagon as well.

And we’ve been tinkering with time ever since. In Canada, it’s a provincial decision, and hardly worth thinking about until the morning you wake up at 6 a.m. only to discover it’s now 7 a.m. Most of Saskatchewan, however, has a real muddle. The province is nominally on Central Standard Time , even though it is in the Mountain Zone, which means it’s effectively on DST all year –round. What?

All I know is that all of this backwarding and forwarding of the clocks is annoying, and is really just a nostalgic reminder of how businesses ran a century ago. Today’s businesses operate around the clock, like it or not, and syncing time with the United States is as silly as attempting to synch to Australia or China – if you need to do business there, you’ll figure out how. The idea that we all need to work at exactly the same time and in exactly the same way is controlling and paternalistic, and about as useful as a vestigial tail.

Getting rid of Daylight Saving would be as simple as beginning it – just stop. It seems that no one’s bothered to address the issue recently, because it IS such a simple thing.

But it is a silly idea that’s run its course. It is confusing, annoying, and doesn’t save time or energy, so why bother? Down with Daylight Saving! I’ll remember to change my smoke alarm battery some other way!

Legalize It!

I’m sure it wasn’t the Canadian government’s intention to play Lucy snatching the football away before Charlie Brown can kick it. But it’s getting harder and harder to trust that the Trudeau government has any intention of following through on promises to legalize and/or regulate marijuana use, medically or recreationally.

Canadian voters feel betrayed. We all had our own reasons to reject the Harper government, but the Liberal election campaign put the pot issue front and centre as a large part of the Liberal Party policy initiatives, that “breath of fresh air” we were told was coming to Ottawa. A lack of action on this issue betrays the constituency that voted the Liberals into office, and paints the party as no different to the Conservatives, who at least made their rejection of legalization cut and dried.

On Wednesday, roughly 500,000 medical cannabis users in Canada over the age of 25 got a small reprieve from the fear of imprisonment for possession, when a Federal Court judge struck down a ban on home growing. The previous government had put that into place when Ottawa moved to a system of large-scale commercial producers, once more putting commerce before citizens’ needs.

Justice Michael Phelan ruled that those new bans were “over broad and arbitrary,” effectively forcing patients to choose between their medicine and prison, and added, “I agree that the plaintiffs have, on a balance of probabilities, demonstrated that cannabis can be produced safely and securely with limited risk to public safety and consistently with the promotion of public health.”

There are around two dozen commercial producers right now, who ship legal, dried marijuana and cannabis oils to about 30,000 patients. Even under the new math, that still means the other 470,000 patients are getting relief elsewhere.

One of the arguments put forward has been that if people are allowed to grow their own, ‘everyone’ will do it. Really? Just like ‘everyone’ brewing their own beer and making wine in their homes has decimated legal trade in alcohol? Neither the Beer Store nor the LCBO seem to be hurting for customers.

Having the right to grow your own doesn’t mean every user wants to do so. Not everyone wants to tend to plants, even if they’re looking forward to the harvest. The plants stink, for one thing, which might be a big deterrent to someone with cancer treatment induced nausea. And it’s hard to imagine that someone with a long-term or terminal illness wants to spend much of their precious time worrying that the plants are getting enough light, or that they’ve remembered to water and fertilize regularly.

But more importantly, a large percentage of Canadians admit to using marijuana, whether medically or recreationally, for the same reasons their parents used alcohol – relaxation and pain relief. The Liberals won the last election with a promise to legalize pot. We were told that process could take more than a year. What we didn’t expect was that Bill Blair, parliamentary secretary to the justice minister and Toronto’s former police chief, would be put in charge of the task force to consult and craft new laws around marijuana.

Blair, a by-the-books hard ass who famously oversaw the utilization of violent repression against protesters at G8/20, has insisted the government will take proper time to consult and proceed with caution — and he wouldn’t even commit to passing legislation before the next federal election.

At the same time, licensed producers have been lobbying the government for a role in recreational production. The big pharmacy chains like Shoppers Drug Mart are drooling over the chance to sell the drug. Municipalities, meanwhile, are dealing with the proliferation of illegal dispensaries.

Clive Weighill, president of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, is begging the government to clear up the confusion his officers are facing.

“Right now it’s just a big fog,” he said. “We know it’s going to be legalized, but we don’t know how it’s going to happen, who’s going to be consulted. If they could just come out with a real bare bones action plan, just so the Canadian public can say OK, these are the steps we’re going through.”

Enforcing a law that the government has declared it will eliminate is not just confusing, it’s unethical. There is no moral basis for enforcing a law that remains on the books, even as the government moves towards repeal. The people spoke to the ethical standards of the community when they elected the Liberal Party with a very strong mandate. I’ll say it again: It is unethical and immoral to continue enforcing a law that is in the process of being repealed.

As Blair fiddles, thousands of users keep getting burned for possession, and the black market continues to thrive.

Blair has said that the goal is to strictly regulate the drug, restrict its access to minors, and to take billions of dollars in black market sales away from organized crime groups. He’s just going to need … oh .. about four years … to do that.. Blair, it’s shit or get off the ‘pot’ time, indeed.

The Trudeau government needs to take a long, hard look at Blair, and admit he’s just not the right choice for the job. You’re allowed to make mistakes in hiring, as long as you admit to the mistake and correct it. Blair himself called the number of Canadians charged with possession “shocking,” noting that in 2014 alone there were 22,000 charges laid, and that minority and aboriginal communities are disproportionately affected.

Blair says his concern is ‘public health.’ That flies in the face of science, as both Canadian and American scientists, amongst others, determined more than thirty years ago that marijuana was not dangerous and in fact had many scientifically-documented, medically beneficial, uses.

Ah, but it’s not that simple, says Blair. Why yes. Yes it is. It’s as simple as buying a can of beer or a pack of cigarettes. Alcohol and tobacco are 100% legal and have risks for ALL users, and often, those around them. But they’re legal.

It is that simple. This was a hot button, contentious, election promise and it needs to be kept. Sell cannabis at liquor stores or pharmacies or dispensaries, tax it, and require government issued ID to purchase it. We already have an existing legal framework for the regulation of alcohol and tobacco. States in the U.S. have hammered out regulations, and are reaping the tax benefits and new employment from the sales.

It took Colorado 34 days, from November 6th, 2012 when the citizens voted to legalize, until December 10th, 2012 when it became legal. This is not a four year process unless you make it one.

Crocodile tears don’t cut it, Blair. What’s the real reason you’re dragging your feet on this, beyond your own bias? What’s your basis for continuing to prosecute and persecute people who use a substance less dangerous than alcohol, tobacco, or even over the counter aspirin?

Cannabis activist Jodie Emery may have nailed the problem. “We need a moratorium on arrests and we need amnesty for two million Canadians since 1965 who have been given criminal records,” she told CBC News Network’s Power & Politics.

Well, that just flies in the face of our bloated, inefficient prison system, doesn’t it! Continued arrests and prosecution of cannabis are a waste of taxpayer money, but they sure do keep the police and prisons busy! Why aren’t the police instead focused on pursuing hard drugs like meth, and cracking down on large importers and its producers? Is it because the low hanging fruit just looks so much juicier?

And devising complicated new laws and regulations covering every possible misuse or abuse of marijuana is nothing but a ‘make work’ project. There are already laws in place that cover every possible scenario. Some kid creeps into your backyard and steals your plants? That’s trespass and theft. Charge the kid. Some guy has 100 stinky plants growing in his house, or gawd forbid, his rented apartment? That’s a commercial business, not allowed on personal property. And destruction of rental property carries some hefty fines, if not jail time. Step away from the grownup blowing a joint, and go bust the real criminals.

This is not rocket science. Every nitpicking argument has been discussed and discarded, to the satisfaction of everyone but the most self-righteous and sanctimonious pearl clutchers. There will always be those who are against the legalization of anything, be it booze, pot, or completely naked strippers. Get over it. This is supposed to be a democratic nation, where adults make choices at their own considered risk. Continuing to ‘police’ the consumption of a drug less harmful than most of the ‘prescribed’ drugs on the market is outrageous and condescending.

Legalizing it should be done arbitrarily and without debate, the same way that it was originally criminalized in 1923, when it was added to the list of dangerous narcotics. High handed prohibition based primarily on a need to control and on personal bias, disregards the people’s right to self-determination and denies them the right to make personal choices in their own lives.

Simply taking what was once illegal and rendering it legal by government proclamation has been done throughout Canada’s history. Dragging out decriminalization/legalization as a policy point necessary for re-election will ensure the Liberals lose the ground they won in the last election. Just another promise not kept, the voters manipulated for political gain. The current government ignores that reality at their own peril.

***

Speaking of ignoring the voice of the people, the ‘unelectable’ Bernie Sanders continues to pick up momentum in the United States, despite a media that focuses on an increasingly bombastic and power mad Donald Trump, who very much seems to be in the grip of a psychotic break.

Sanders’ followers are as desperate to get out from under their current government as we Canadians were during the last election. His latest campaign ad captures the excitement and creativity inherent in his promises. Is asking for transparency in government, and real equality for all, doomed to failure? I guess we’ll find out in November.

Bernie’s new campaign ad rocks!

(first published Fe 28/2016 -bobsegarini.wordpress.com/2016/02/28/roxanne-tellier-legalize-it/)

Music City My Ass

Every time I see an article lauding Mayor John Tory’s ‘inspired’ idea of turning Toronto into a ‘Music City,’ I get queasy. You see, I came to Toronto in 1976, when it really WAS one, and have watched succeeding local governments and well-heeled blue noses, waving the banners of political correctness and money over art, stomp the culture to death.

Being a great deal older now than I was then (it happens,) I understand, at least in part, why the city had to change from what – to me – was a cornucopia of musical delights, as dirty and scary as it was,, into what it is today … a staid dowager in corsets trying desperately to seem hip.

In ’76, the Yorkville of the sixties was already undergoing gentrification, with trendy shops springing up where head shops once ruled, and the few hippie hold outs clinging to their properties out of loyalty or desperation. Disco fevered platformed shoes trod the sacred ground in front of the Riverboat as I’d wander through on the way to The Morrissey at Yonge and Davenport.

The scene had already moved on to other areas, with Yonge Street the main rock drive, and club after club rocking exceptional talent, with rarely a cover charge, six nights a week, cheek by jowl with strip clubs, massage parlours, peep shows, and sex shops. Sleazy, garish, lewd and loud, the Strip was very much like New York’s Time Square of the period, ugly and yet so seductive. And everybody smoked like chimneys – in the clubs, the patios and the streets.

Gay men and women flocked to the Church and Wellesley area, where they could feel safer than on the butchier Strip. Although this year’s Pride Week and Parade celebrating sexual and gender identity will have sponsors as diverse as TD Canada Trust, Bud Light, Via Rail, and Google+, back then, openly gay people were widely marginalized, shunned, and attacked in the mainstream media and politics. In 1975, “tiny perfect” mayor David Crombie sent his best wishes to Pride’s organizers, but refused to officially recognize Pride, while City Council declined permission for a Yonge Street march .

And in 1981, Metro Toronto police made the second largest mass arrest in Canadian history when 306 people where busted in the infamous bathhouse raids. It was safer hanging out at `the steps` in front of the Second Cup on Church and Wellesley.

However heteros were in luck in 1975, when the city legalized full nudity for strippers. It became pretty common for the bigger bars to have strippers by day, and live bands at night.

Black American R&B and soul stars, sick to death of segregation and persecution in their own country, flocked to play the BlueNote, the Edison, and the Colonial Tavern, where they were enthusiastically received.

Prior to new hate-speech laws of 2007, the biggest reggae acts out of Jamaica would visit Toronto at least twice a year. Anti-gay language in many of their songs, while common in their country, was not welcome here.

The city was dirty, and exciting, and counter culture was hiding in neighbourhoods that were being redefined to suit their residents’ tastes. Queen West was where you went to find head shops and record stores, and check out the Sally Ann for vintage clothing stores. Later, it was Toronto’s punk centre, as the kids from OCA made their own music. And later still you’d find Chris Sheppard spinning at Club Domino before heading up the long thin stairs to the Voodoo Club.

You could have shot a cannon along King West any time after business hours, and never hit a soul,in the late 70s. In the 80s and 90s, street kids and skin heads hung out at the Evergreen Centre, which, though nominally a drop in, support centre for kids, was actually where you went to score drugs. You could get a whole tray of draft beer at the Gasworks for about $5.00 if you bought it before the bands started, and cheap quarts fuelled a lot of rockers through the hot nights.

Out in Scarborough, clubs like the Knob Hill boasted top local talent while the waiters, legends themselves, sold watery draft for a quarter a glass. In Richmond Hill, anyone who was anyone hung at the Black Hawk Motor Inn.

There really were so many amazing clubs in diverse areas, reflecting the different interests and sounds Toronto wanted to hear. And yes, there was a “Toronto Sound,” and you knew it when you heard it.

So what killed that diverse, energetic culture? Couple of things – and most involved the corporatization of the city. In a quest to bring in funds for the city, ridiculous and arcane licensing regulations picked the pockets of bar owners. It was only last year that the city issued a memo stating that music venues would no longer be ticketed for posters – usually posted by the bands desperate to market a rare gig – advertising their shows.

Yorkville fell to gentrification, and soon, anywhere that the kids flocked began to look like prime real estate. Watching Queen West change from funky to glitz was painful enough for those who’d loved its grunge, but harder still on the residents and business owners who’d made it what it was. Rents soared until a club was walking such a thin profit margin that an off winter could bury them. These days, a shop or bar owner in Kensington Market is looking at paying from $3500 to $9000 a month for basic rent, with virtually no owner maintenance applied. Riverdale , Parkdale, Dufferin Grove, the Junction – all fallen to gentrification that brings more big bucks to those who already have the big bucks, and leaves previous residents out of luck for a reasonable price on a place to live or play.

No one is FOR drunk driving, but the founders of MADD went a little mad themselves as they ground down and down to get to the current laws. Drivers under 21 cannot have ANY alcohol in their blood when driving. Over 21, you have to have a blood alcohol level that is lower than .05%, essentially what you’ll get from a non-alcoholic beverage. You don’t even have to be in a moving car to get an impaired driving violation. If you are sitting behind the wheel of a vehicle, moving or not, and have too much alcohol in your system you can get a fine, lose your license and face other penalties.

And for all the fuss over drinking and driving, I’m trying to remember the last time I saw a club that gave free non-alcoholic beverages to a “Designated Driver”.

If you smoke in Toronto, good luck. It’s getting harder and harder to find a place, inside or out, where you can light up. When the new law of not smoking on patios took effect, I knew they’d gone too far. Can’t drink, can’t smoke … what do you do? Why go to a bar at all? May as well stay home – assuming your apartment or condo allows smoking – and drink without the hassle.

The whole corporate model of making money at the expense of art just doesn’t work long term, There’s less investment in the arts – last year, ScotiaBank pulled funding for Nuit Blanche, Caribana, BuskerFest and the CHIN International Picnic. Responding to the dog whistles of stockholders that must have their profits leads to the death of corporate sponsorship of the arts. And good luck with sponsorship of counterculture art. The Big Bop gets torn down to become an upscale furniture store. Liberty Entertainment closes alt-rock venue the Velvet Underground at 510 Queen West to focus on growing its portfolio of wine bars.

While donating multiple millions of dollars’ worth of land and funds to conventional arts palaces like the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, Toronto City Council quibbles over what constitutes sound restrictions applied to bars. Thou shalt have no music louder than 45 db after 11 pm. A library clocks in at 50-70, a restaurant with no live band at about 90-100. This is progress?

Municipal licensing issues debate over whether a venue is a restaurant with a bar attached, or an entertainment venue. Despite a 2012 report by lobby group Music Canada that outlined ridiculous restrictions to entertainment venues that give ample room for official interpretation (and fines,) the City still loves its condo owners a lot more than it does its club owners. You can read the full report here (http://musiccanada.com/resources/research/toronto-music-city/)

The ‘idea’ of making Toronto a “Music City” is great. In practice, there needs to be a great deal more cooperation on the part of the City in how it deals with current and future venues. What’s been forgotten in a lust for overall incoming revenue from ticket sales, corporate sponsorship and enhanced tourism is that you don’t just add water and stir up a musical culture … it’s made by musicians who fall far outside of the strictures imposed by those who can afford to attend the venues government has deigned to sponsor. It’s made in alleyways and smoky bars, it includes over indulgence in both legal and illegal substances, and it’s a cry AGAINST what Mayor Tory and his Council represent.

If Toronto is serious about doing more than endlessly discussing what they`d do for the city if they could, but apparently can`t, they`ll have to do better than the recent WaveLength panel on The Toronto Music Moment. The latest meeting, held on January 31^stsaw Jonny Dovercourt and moderator Emily Scherzinger along with Amy Terrill (Music Canada, 4479 Toronto), Daniel Silver (U of T Sociology, Chicago Music City researcher), Rolf Klausener (The Acorn, Arboretum Festival) and Ayo Leilani (Witch Prophet, Above Top Secret, 88 Days of Fortune) hash through basically the same points they did on previous gatherings, and presumably will rehash again at next year`s meeting.

Oh, sure, there are pockets of musical fun to be had in Toronto, and certainly, when the music fests start rolling out in a few months, there will be whole weeks where it seems like the city comes alive in technicolor.

But the following week, the smiles will drop from the faces of the law, the controls will snap back into place with a vengeance, and you’ll once more be unable to get ready public transit from point A to point B. The RIDE programs will stop a lot of entertainment seekers from having more than one beverage, and smokers will try desperately to find somewhere they can still indulge their (legal) vice.

You don’t get to have a clean, politically correct, easily controlled society and still call yourself a ‘Music City.’

(originally published Feb 2016 – bobsegarini.wordpress.com/2016/02/21/roxanne-tellier-music-city-my-ass/)