Beth Kaplan's Blog, page 15

Birthday boy, American Fiction, and LE Jewellers

In case you don’t believe me about how busy I’ve been this last while, here’s this week’s day-timer. Incidentally, the recurring note to buy cheap beer is as slug killer. In case you wondered. Not for my sluggish self. Still haven’t made it to the LCBO.

Yesterday dawned wet and dark. I felt for Anna, who had twenty-two or more kids coming over at 5 for Eli’s twelfth birthday party, which of course was meant to be held outside, in the yard and the laneway behind their building. But rain. I decided not to go, that she’d have enough on her hands with so many kids in a small apartment. But she remained optimistic about the weather, and sure enough, mid-afternoon, it cleared up. From her mouth to God’s ears, as they say.

Here’s the photo she sent me of some of the kids there. I post this with immense pride in my daughter, my grandsons, my city, and my country. When I went to school in Halifax, there was not a single non-white person in my south-end school until 1963, when one lone black girl attended. “She’s nice!” I wrote in my diary, as if surprised, although my parents did have many black friends, and in 1965 or 66 hosted the Freedom Singers from the States in our home. My grandsons have grown up in such a multicultural world, they are, truthfully, oblivious to colour and race in a way I can never be, try as I might. It’s a victory for the planet.

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And for Anna, who provides safety, fun, and a great deal of food, including a vast quantity of barbecued stuff that Sam cooked. Six of the kids slept over, and this morning she made pancakes for them all. She is a saint and a lunatic. Both. Most of all, a superb and generous mother, which one day her sons will come to appreciate.

Just between us, yesterday I went to my favourite jewellers to buy Eli’s present. Awhile ago he was in Dollarama with his mother and persuaded her to buy him a chain necklace, which soon broke. She told me he wants a chain, so I rode over to the new location of LE Jewellers, 1362 Queen Street East, at Greenwood. Elaine, the owner, was a dear friend of Wayson’s and is now a dear friend of mine. She was renovicted from her first shop, ended up for the lean pandemic years in a most unsuitable place, and recently managed to move. But now, she says, nobody has money for the lovely sparkly things she sells, at all price points. I promised her I’d write about the shop in this blog.

If you need jewelry, or repairs, or just to look at sparkly things, go to LE jewellers and chat with Elaine. And leave with something pretty. I hope Eli likes his silver chain. I’ll let you know.

Yesterday I also ordered a few things online that I can’t carry on a bike, and somehow ended up with an Amazon Prime membership, how they snuck that by me, I don’t know. Yes, I do, they make it nearly impossible to avoid. In any case, I’ll keep it for a few weeks and get out before I have to pay, but in the meantime will watch films on the site – yesterday, American Fiction, a black writer making fun of white liberal guilt by writing a ridiculous novel about black life that becomes a bestseller. It’s an entertaining film, although the satire is too broad for me. There’s not a single decent or intelligent white person in the film. I know, that’s the point, we’ve stereotyped black characters for so long, now it’s our turn. Got it.

But more egregious, it shows the protagonist writing a bestseller in three minutes of screen time, a book that comes out mere weeks later. Ah yes, that’s just how easy and fast the process is! Sheesh.

It’s a glorious, indeed perfect day, and there’s cleaning to do upstairs; Nicole is here to help. I was going to see the National Theatre Live production of Nye at Cineplex at midday – the play I had a ticket for in London that I had to give away – but it’s too beautiful out and I’m too busy to go. Just doomed not to see Nye. After pondering where I’m going to move to when I’m old and decrepit, I appreciate even more the space and light I have here.

Drink it in, girl, because your time here won’t last forever. As you won’t.

Happy Birthday to all the twelve-year-olds out there!

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thoughts about where to grow old

Instant summer, my friends — from normal spring temperatures to 28 feeling like 35 in seconds. To teach Tuesday, I had to scrabble in my closet for respectable hot weather teaching clothes, hadn’t even brought out my summer gear. Can’t complain, though – the roses are budding like crazy and everything is growing.

It’s been a frantic few days and I’m feeling, as I often am, overwhelmed. My upstairs tenant, a young man who was 22 when he moved in, is now 27 and has just moved out to take a good job in Ottawa. So getting him out and then taking a look at the place and all that needs to be done … yikes. My lovely handyman Doug and I went to Home Depot to buy a new toilet, which luckily Sam was here to cart upstairs – incredibly heavy. Doug installed it today, plus we dealt with other issues, including the busy carpenter bees that had drilled at least nine holes in a wood overhang upstairs. (I splashed vinegar around to tell them they were not welcome and today Doug filled the holes. It reminded me of the time we found a huge nest of flying carpenter ants, horrible things, and then the termite debacle that cost $30,000 to fix. Oh yes, it’s fun, this home ownership business.)

So this morning Doug turned to me as he worked and said, kindly, that he thought the house was perhaps too much for me, this nearly 140-year-old four-story house with two tenants and a big garden. He suggested moving to a condo building on Gerrard he’s worked on, not far, but – I’ve seen those places, and they felt tiny, with a postage stamp garden. So here’s the issue: I complain endlessly about my responsibilities here, but can’t imagine how I’d live without the amenities — the garden, space, light, bird feeder, location, neighbours. I love my neighbours and this ‘hood. I love this house, troubles and all. A difficult issue, particularly for a single woman.

I’m giving myself five years to figure something out and fix it. Assuming, of course, that I remain healthy. One idea: subdivide the house, put in a proper kitchen upstairs, and rent or sell it. A lot of work and money, but – possible. I have a line of credit. Hmmm.

But then I lose my beloved bedroom and my south-facing office with its tons of files and boxes of paper.

That’s life.

In the meantime, mundane work continues. Thomas came over yesterday to spend two hours scrubbing down the deck, which was dark brown when he started and so white this morning, I thought it had snowed.

I’m still putting away woollens and getting out cottons. Tonight I’m riding to the Danforth for a Bach event, part of Bach week. I definitely need some Bach to stop the chatter in my head.

Where will I live as I grow old? Perhaps you are having the same thoughts. What is your solution?

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great news = happy Beth in Mexico

Sunday morning of the long weekend, and the silence is deafening, except for the birds. Not a car or siren, not a streetcar, not even a voice, just birds. And yet if I hopped on my bike, I could be at the heart of the megalopolis’s shopping strip at Yonge and Bloor, or the financial district at King and Yonge, in ten minutes. I marvel.

Just bought marigolds, cucumbers, and lettuce from the corner to plant today. Yesterday, Nicole came to help with the massive job of cleaning out the shed, where things have been piled higglety-pigglety for years, and then the storage shelves in the basement. Exhausted and filthy after two hours, but much was done, very satisfying.

So tidy! For how long?

But before I rhapsodize again about the long weekend, I’d like to share some great news with you. In February 2020, I flew to Mexico to attend the San Miguel Writer’s Festival, less interested in specific workshops and seminars than in getting a feel for the event. I enjoyed it thoroughly — Mexico in February, what’s not to like? Let alone a lovely small town and a massive international gathering of writers. I thought to myself, Self, I thought, you could teach here.

And then Covid hit, so in 2021 the conference went online. In 2022, I applied, a lengthy time-consuming process, and was turned down, though with a nice note saying they liked my application, had too many returning teachers that year, I should apply again. I didn’t the next year but with a big sigh went through the rigamarole of applying for 2025.

Yesterday I opened an email from a name I didn’t recognize. It began:

Dear Beth Kaplan,

Congratulations! It is my pleasure to invite you to join our distinguished faculty for the 2025 San Miguel Writers’ Conference and Literary Festival. This year, we received an unprecedented 375 high-quality and impressive faculty applications, from which your submission has been selected by an eight-member committee.

I stared at it, couldn’t take it in. Wait — I’m in? Someone said yes? I felt like Sally Field — they like me, they really like me! Especially because not long ago, a teaching job I really wanted and felt I deserved went to someone else.

So, a week or two in Mexico in February 2025. A 90-minute workshop taught at least 4 or 5 times: “Tackling Your Memoir: Seven Essential Steps to Courage and Craft.” I’m on it. That’s exactly what I spoke about at the Arts and Letters Club and the synagogue and will speak about again at a Toronto public library in a few weeks. It’s my thing, you could say.

Receiving that invitation was a huge lift and boost. And then a few minutes later two more emails came in, one from a former student and the second from a stranger, about Midlife Solo, how they relate, how much this essay or that reminds them of their own lives.

My cup runneth. Etc. Especially because the lilac is still in full bloom.

Today, a long quiet Sunday, planting, errands, but right now, dancing with Nicky and her tribe on Zoom.

Since I’ve no other nice photos to share with you, I’ll post this lovely one that just popped up from 2014, at the launch of All My Loving. Eleanor, the best of the best. I will listen to Writers&Company today. I bet it’ll be Alice.

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the silence of the holiday weekend

The Saturday of the Victoria Day long weekend, and the city is deserted; the market this morning was quiet. It’s a lovely time in the city for those of us without cottages, especially because there was rain yesterday and today everything is pouring forth scent. My lilac especially.

A quick note, as I should be doing my chores, planting, cooking, weeding, tidying, and would rather sit here chatting with you.

On Thursday a huge treat: a book club meeting with six avid members who’d read my book. When the first walked in, she exclaimed, “Are you the writer? I LOVED your book!” and threw her arms around me. The others did the same. It was heartening. I can’t imagine readers throwing their arms around Alice Munro, but then, I’m not reserved and dignified, as she was, and my life is splashed onto the pages in a way hers was not. “I feel as if I know you!” said one.

Nicest was when they went around the circle telling me which story was their favourite. But then one nearly dissolved into tears, saying she’s in a similar position to me at the start of the book, her father recently gone and a divorce looming. She was glad to see how well I’d come through. I talked about what helped me, like my shrink, but also that writing, processing, chronicling helped. Helps.

There’s something wrong with this laptop; it overheats and I can hear the motor churning. I’ll have to take it in and live without it for a bit. YIKES! I hope I don’t need a new one, with a new furnace on the horizon and much else. Time to write a new bestseller.

LOL.

Last night, something completely different, to the show at the Tranzac Club put on by my friend Stella Walker, queen of the absurd. It was the launch of her marvellous book of poetry, The Rose on the Windowsill of My Pain and Confusion, by her alter-ego Vera the Poetess, (in the tradition of “Sarah Binks, the sweet songstress of Saskatchewan”). Much hilarity ensued. She’d sent me the poems months ago and asked for a blurb, which was a challenge, as the work is of course very good in its badness. I’m quoted on the back cover as saying, “Vera, the Bard of Toronto, shares her poesy with such blithe confidence that her pain and confusion become ours.” Martha Chaves wrote, “Vera is to poetry what Wayne Gretzky is to poetry.”

It’s very brave to stand up and make people laugh. Much needed. Thank you, Stella.

Wednesday was the yahrzeit – the day of death – of my beloved Patsy Ludwick, who received MAID when her ALS was no longer tolerable. Also on Wednesday there was an article about how they might have found a cure for ALS, at least for some kinds. It’s a hideous disease that also took my friend Elke Town. May the cure come quickly.

A meme on the internet. Yes! Tell it like it is! No, not really. No money, perhaps not much pride from family, but happiness, yes, especially when someone throws their arms around you and says, “I LOVED your book!” All worth it, after that.

Now, out to plant arugula.

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about Alice (and Wayson)

Alice Munro. What to say that hasn’t been said? The miracle of her — a brilliant, sharp-eyed girl from small-town Ontario, watching, processing, taking it all in, pouring it all out. Writing, we learned, on top of the washing machine after her kids had gone to school. I read once that she had so little confidence in herself, she scribbled stories on the backs of the envelopes bills came in, eventually stitching them together and daring to submit them.

I like to read in bed, before sleep. Once I made the mistake of taking one of Alice’s books to bed and had to shut it and put it away. Not bedtime reading, Alice Munro. What you think will be gentle stories of women’s lives are often, in the most subtle ways, brutal, violent, terrifying. What pleasure it was, though, to get the latest New Yorker and find a new story by her, sitting down immediately to read it — in daylight.

I have a travel diary of my father’s, when he went to China in the mid-seventies. On one page, he wrote, “Reading Lives of Girls and Women. Excellent. Send to Beth.” And he did.

French Lynn’s Ph.D. thesis in linguistics was about “The use of if, and, or but” in one story of Alice Munro’s.

On top of her brilliance and dedication, she was beautiful, gracious, dignified. Thank you, Alice, for the fierce unrelenting spotlight of your gaze, and for the extraordinary gift you gave to all Canadian writers, of showing that we matter on the world stage. Here’s a lovely NYT tribute by Sheila Heti:

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/15/opinion/what-alice-munro-would-never-do.html

We did have our Mother’s Day feast, preceded and followed by much bouncing on the remains of the trampoline by Ben, Sam, and Bandit, who loves bouncing. The best part was reading a few chapters of The Island of the Blue Dolphins to them in the sunshine. As I’ve said before, the main reason to have children and grandchildren is so you can re-explore great kids’ books, and, in cases like this, discover them for the first time. She’s alone on an island with a pack of wild dogs! What will happen?

Yesterday at 5.45, on my way to teach at U of T, I was riding my bike through Queen’s Park, packed with children and grownups playing in the sun, when a young man riding an electric bike sped nearby. He was riding far too fast through a very crowded area. “Slow down,” I called to him. “Fuck you!” he snarled, speeding up.

I’ve made the mistake of subscribing to Jonathan Haight’s Substack. He writes about the degradation of our world because of social media, especially for young people, and it’s depressing as hell. He talks about the horrors freely available to kids on their smartphones — that a friend’s 9-year-old daughter at choir practice received a video of an actual beheading, that a huge percentage of young children have viewed pornography. He showed a photo of a young woman splayed on the railway lines outside Auschwitz, posing for a sexy selfie. There’s a heedless self-centredness that comes from obsession with the screen, the Likes, what others are doing, that is, as he says, degrading our world.

And Biden is sending a billion dollars worth of arms to Israel. So that’s my day done.

No, I won’t end there. My friend Louise in Ottawa just sent me a picture she took of me with my beloved Wayson at my 60th birthday party. I’d made name tags for everyone. Mine says, “Beth. Aging gracefully.” His says, “Wayson. Supreme guru.”

Let’s end on love. And another great writer, gone but never forgotten.

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the great gifts of writing

We did not celebrate Mother’s Day in my family. It didn’t make a dent, I guess dismissed by my lefty parents. Maybe it wasn’t such a big deal in those days in any case. I forbid my own kids to make useless, expensive gestures like flowers or cards, unless they’re homemade. But I hope today my son and grandsons are cooking dinner for Anna and me. That’s the plan, we’ll see how it plays out. The plan is steak, salads, and veg. The steak, of course, bought by me.

And this after sending them a diatribe about the degradation of our food by a few massive companies, expounded in an interview with Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation. He says we should be eating thirty different plants a week, and I’m determined to eat less meat and more veg. After today.

That interview, by the way, was at the start of Bill Maher, where he often interviews really interesting people, with the exception of Robert Kennedy Jr., he of the worm brain, the other week. But after Schlosser, the discussion veered so drastically to the right that I turned it off after five minutes. Bill and his guests are indefensible when it comes to the Gaza war – viciously one-sided. I’m done with him.

But importantly, this morning, in a Substack I receive, was a heartbreaking Mother’s Day essay by a very old friend of mine from Halifax days. She and her husband lost both their beautiful, accomplished children, who were in their twenties, to cystic fibrosis. They had all worked tirelessly for the cause, fundraising and raising awareness, but despite all their work, both children died. One of the hardest things I’ve ever done was to write both obituaries for the Globe. My friend wrote powerfully about what this day means, how acts of kindness have helped her through. I wept.

Despite all my worries about my crazy kids and grandkids, I could not be more grateful that they are there, across town.

All this made me think about the gift of writing – the obits my gift to them, this essay, which must have been very hard to write, her thoughtful gift to us. This week, in my home class, a student wrote about his best friend since childhood, still a dear friend after decades, despite the miles and the years. We in class were happy to hear a tribute to male friendships, a subject we don’t hear about enough. I said, Send it to him. The writer did, and reported that his friend was “deeply moved and blown away.”

We writers take note. We chronicle. Most of the world does not. So often, what we write is a gift to others. And to ourselves.

My friend Penny, whose story “Correspondence” is included in Midlife Solo, just wrote, You write beautifully, Beth. You bring the joy out of the sorrow and describe archetypal experiences so poignantly.  I am sure I am not the only one who sees myself and my life reflected in your lens.

That’s a gift I try to give. And something given to me – went to Ben McNally’s yesterday to sign six books a friend ordered to be mailed to her. Six books! Thank you!

Last night I went to hear the Art of Time ensemble with its tribute to Joni Mitchell, 14 songs rearranged and sung by different singers. What gifts that woman has, not only of music but of poetry. My review of the concert, however, is mixed. The orchestra was stellar, superb, but the singers, mostly, not so much. They showed, despite great effort, how hard it is to sing Joni’s material, with its effortless soaring and diving. The exception was the lovely Sarah Slean, equally effortless. Go, Joni!

I’m supposed to be gardening today but it’s an iffy day, sun then cloud. I’ll garden another day and cook instead. Plants.

Happy Sunday to you, and Happy Mother’s Day to those who celebrate.

Below, 2010.

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The Department of Nice Things

Nice Things: At my first U of T class of term this week, a student told me she first took my class 14 years ago. “I’ve taken many writing classes since,” she said, “but your’s was the best.” So she came back. What a nice thing.

A group of former students years ago formed a writing group and hired me to come in to edit periodically, latterly on Zoom. Today they’re moving on and said goodbye , telling me that my “particular genius” is “bringing people together in harmony and safety,” “making everyone feel part of the same process,” “that every voice is important.” The importance of dialogue, of putting yourself in the story. The words they won’t forget: What is this really about? Why are you telling me this story? One of them will have an essay in the Globe next week. NICE!

And another wrote and sang a song about how the class changed her life. Triple nice.

And finally, a Midlife Solo reader wrote that she’s partway through. “I love your essays. I have always associated the term essay with painful academic drudge, and suddenly here is a revitalised form, full of love and life. Inspiring.”

Grateful for these gifts.

Busy busy busy. I have regained energy! My lungs are clearer! I’m waking up at 5.45 and can’t get back to sleep, so a nap midday is essential. But today, I had the class on Zoom and have another tonight in my living room, then welcome old friends coming from Montreal and staying here for two days. So, much cleaning and tidying, sweeping away winter detritus. The lilac and the viburnum are competing to smell sweetest, and the rest of the garden is doing its miraculous best to bloom. Year after year after year, I marvel at the renewal.

Patrick and I posted a short except from the audiobook on Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/p/C6wjVrJryK9/

Sunday I went to a concert at the Arts and Letters Club, that lovely dignified place – Caitlin Broms-Jacobs, a superb oboe player, playing modern pieces with a pianist, two of the composers in attendance, Alexina Louie one of them. What a haunting, melancholy instrument the oboe is; no wonder it’s used so much in klezmer music. Caitlin’s mother Pat was my writing student for some time and is effortlessly creative herself. And her grandmother was Jane Jacobs. An extraordinary family.

On Monday morning to Beth Tzedec Synagogue, to give a talk to their seniors group. When I arrived, an elderly man asked what the talk would be about, and when I replied, how to write memoir, he told me he had absolutely no interest in writing memoir. Hmm, a good start, I thought. But in fact, the room was soon filled with keen faces, even this guy. They asked very good questions. “Every time an old person dies, a library burns down,” is one of my favourite sayings, nowhere more relevant than in a room full of old people who should start to preserve their memories without delay.

I was on the subway home when I saw a face I recognized – Mattea Roach, the Canadian Jeopardy superstar. I don’t usually watch the program, but I watched her win and sometimes watch when they bring her back. She’s self-deprecating and funny and utterly brilliant, with a breathtaking breadth of knowledge and a phenomenal memory. She won a fortune on the show. But there she was on the subway with the rest of us plebs.

And as reported, on Tuesday I put on a bra and respectable clothes and rode across town to U of T. A wonderful group, very mixed, young and older, from all over the world. I’m looking forward to the journey. It was good to see a whole person again, not just a head in a box on screen. Though I like that too.

Just finished a beautiful book, How to be a good creature: a memoir in 13 animals, by Sy Montgomery. Succinct and powerful, highly recommended.

For Mother’s Day on Sunday, I’ve suggested to Anna that as our present, we ask our men – her boys and Sam – to make us dinner. I’ve said I’ll eat anything as long as they’ve cooked it and there’s at least one vegetable. We’ll see what they reply.

At least one good creature doesn’t care.

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Midlife Solo audiobook out now

Good news! The audiobook is out, my dulcet tones reading some of my most important stories. Thrillsies! as I used to say. Banner by Patrick.

Yesterday, beautiful, hot; today, dark and wet, and so much happening outside — our annual local Forsthia Festival; the Toronto Marathon that speeds by near here; and, Anna tells me, a Kites for Gaza festival on Don Valley East, more peaceful than encampments. But all will be wet.

Wednesday, to the Art Gallery to see an exhibition of art by women and then to dinner in the bistro there, celebrating Toronto Lynn’s birthday. The exhibit is wonderful and exhaustive, proving categorically that women artists were for centuries unjustly sidelined and marginalized. Here’s one example of painstaking handiwork:

The intricacy! Made in England in 1707 by Anna Maria Garthwaite, knife-cut cut-paperwork with pinpricking and collage.

On Thursday my gardening helper Jannette arrived to prune — unlike yours truly, she’s a skilled, meticulous pruner — and to see what’s working and what’s not. Almost overnight the garden sprang from brown to green — the viburnum wafting sweet scent — and the squirrels have even left a few tulips, though not many. We found a big hole, evidence of rat, and of course we have raccoons, skunks, and opossums. I confess, though, I barely have energy for the garden right now, with everything else piled up, leaving me, as usual, overwhelmed.

On Friday, my beloved daughter’s 43rd birthday; I brought two cakes for the party, where there was a ton of food, this time prepared not by Anna, for once, but by her best friend Holly. The boys were with Matt, so it was strangely quiet.

And yesterday, a housewarming party clear across town, thrown by my writer friend Kirsten, a barbecue in the garden on a lovely evening with lots of interesting people, including a young woman who researches and imports organic French wines — now there’s a great job — and the Italian/French/Canadian woman who designed Kirsten’s kitchen, and her French husband. When people at events like this hear what I do, they often tell me how they’ve always wanted to write but haven’t had time or nerve. Start, I say. No time like now. Pick up a pen and start.

Speaking of which – tomorrow I give a talk to a bunch of seniors about memoir, and Tuesday evening am in a U of T classroom for the first time since March 2020. Wearing a bra and respectable pants and shoes. Sheesh.

Everywhere, apocalyptic talk about how dire the situation is in the world right now. But it’s hard to be too gloomy, even on a gloomy day, when it’s spring and smells of new life.

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Familiarity breeds contentment

I am still landing, still recuperating, I guess, from nearly 3 weeks of travel and being sick. Not much energy. But yesterday I went to the Y for the first time in a month, and it felt so good to be moving, if slowly, with my team. I need to build muscle again. Much ground lost.

Strange to say, but it feels like home, that gym, that change room. Those long-term Y friends are home to me.

As I write, I am fondling my belly, encased in the softest 2-ply cashmere. Went to Doubletake today expecting nothing, because the place is so crowded these days — I resent these Johnny-come-lately’s invading my store! On my way out, I saw an interesting sleeve, stopped, fondled. Cashmere. A grey sweater, oversized, for $3. I may never take it off. Still treasure to be found there.

Speaking of treasure, on Sunday the boys came with their mother for Sunday dinner. They are beautiful and difficult. Having two parents is a huge help, but if there’s only one, it should be a strong woman like Anna. It was a lovely evening, so after dinner, before ice cream for dessert, we proposed a walk, which they vehemently opposed. Ben retired to write something and appeared with a note which read, “We r not going to the park onlis we get ice cream.”

LOL. We went to the park before ice cream, but it wasn’t easy.

Sunday night, 60 Minutes on the difficult lives of the children of U.S. military PTSD sufferers, and the final episode of Mr. Banks vs. the Post Office, a shocking saga that continues to this day. What good a timely drama can effect! Bravo to all concerned.

This is my last week before teaching starts again next Tuesday, the first time I’ve taught in person since March 2020. In a classroom. Wearing respectable clothes! Several bits of business first. 1. There’s still room in the course, Life Stories 1, Tuesdays 6.30 -9.

2. My upstairs tenant, who’s been here for five years, is leaving at the end of May for a job in Ottawa, so a bed-sitting room will be available for rent for some lovely, quiet, unobtrusive person.

3. And most important of all, I’m asking everyone who reads this blog and who has read Midlife Solo and enjoyed it to consider REVIEWING IT, on Amazon or on Goodreads. It helps. Every bit helps. Thank you!

Now getting ready for Annie, who’s coming for a walk and dinner. Lack of energy notwithstanding, I could not be happier to be surrounded by familiar people and places.

Aka home.

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reaching the end of Bill Maher

I feel like I’m in recovery mode. I AM in recovery mode. Travels are over, for now; my bug is diminished, and I’m feeling better. It’s a damp grey day and all I want to do is sit in my favourite chair looking at the new green outside. And be home.

A final journey yesterday, from Ottawa to Toronto in a train car so noisy and bumpy, there were complaints and we were invited to move to another car. “This car needs to go into the shop!” said the conductor. I was amazed, as we sailed through Ontario, how much unused land there is, mostly wild woods. In Europe, there’s no unused land; it’s all inhabited or tidily parcelled out farmland or industrial or something else. But here, mile after mile of trees, bramble, and bracken. We have space to burn.

I finished an entertaining Agatha Christie — Oh no, Hercule Poirot died! — and a peanut butter sandwich, and we pulled into Union Station. Downtown was a zoo, Friday rush hour with a Blue Jays game that evening. But at last, home. Where I can eat and sleep and do what I want when I want. Thank you, powers that be.

Last night, I watched Bill Maher, though I’m reaching the point that I won’t be able to. Anna of course won’t go near him, a liberal firmly on the right on too many issues. I defend watching because of the intelligent, connected people from a spectrum of political viewpoints he chats with — never less than interesting. But last night reached the limits of my tolerance — first, a talk with Robert Kennedy Jr., with his insufferable paranoia about just about everything and his unbearable voice. But he’s obviously intelligent and appeals to some — especially young people, he says — and it’s important to hear him.

Then Bill and his guests, including Don Lemon who’s usually pretty good, proceeded to trash the Gaza college protests, saying the young protesters are ignorant, misguided, self-serving, anti-Semitic narcissists glued to TikTok. I do agree when Bill said, about protesters blocking traffic, “It doesn’t help your cause when you make people late to pick up their kids from daycare.” But no one mentioned the atrocities in Gaza or the West Bank. Bill pointed to other injustices in the world that deserve to be protested, including the brutal repression of women in some Muslim countries. Yes, there are many other terrible things to protest, and yes, some of the protesters are probably misguided. But many are deeply passionate, idealistic young people appalled at the horrors they see and doing what they can to register their dismay and desire for peace.

We must never forget that there’s a vital difference, a huge divide, between on one hand the criminal Netanyahu, his heedless enablers, and the racist, violent West Bank settlers, and on the other, almost all the Jewish people in the world, as horrified as everyone else by what’s being perpetrated by fellow Jews. It’s heartbreaking.

As the always succinct Bernie Sanders said to Netanyahu, “It is not anti-Semitic to hold you accountable.”

We need something to cheer us up these days. Spring will do. Magnolias will do. And the library will do. This is the first hold notification I’ve received in many months, since our fabulous library system was hacked last fall and many services stopped. Welcome back, beloved library.

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