James Bow's Blog, page 13

Day of Atonement

I was thinking about writing a post about the “controversy” of not celebrating Canada Day this year, when Brittlestar posted the video below and took the words right out of my mouth:

It’s not going to stop me from speaking on this, though.

It does not feel appropriate to celebrate Canada Day today, in the wake of the revealing of over a thousand bodies of children buried in unmarked graves in just a handful of residential schools investigated so far, and the likely thousands more that will be discovered in the weeks and months ahead. It feels wrong to celebrate a country that empowered and encouraged the religious organizations that ran those schools in a concerted effort to rob First Nations people of their language, history, and culture. This is no time for fireworks, though I know this isn’t going to stop people from setting off fireworks in the trail behind my house. I won’t judge these people more than I usually do.

At the same time, I won’t go so far as to say “Cancel Canada Day”. A handful of individuals, in their justifiable horror and anger over what’s being brought to our attention, have strayed towards saying that Canada as a whole is unworthy of being celebrated, ever. One individual on Twitter, who later admitted he’d brought it on himself, asked what good had Canada ever given the world. He was, of course, inundated: the Canadarm. Insulin. Peacekeepers. The fact that we refused follow George W. Bush’s imperialist ambitions into Iraq in 2003. The fact that 26,771 Torontonians came out to get vaccinated against COVID-19 and set a world record for most vaccinations done in one place in one day, in the face of idiot anti-vaxxers who tried to disrupt the process. The list went on.

Brittlestar adds another thing to be proud of: there’s the fact that Canada has made itself a home for hundreds of thousands of refugees, giving them new life after they fled their war-torn homes. True, this happened after we spectacularly failed to do this for Jewish refugees on the eve of the Second World War, but we at least learned, and have welcomed most recently tens of thousands of Syrians into our communities, and have enabled our recent immigrants to build decent lives without forcibly robbing them of their culture.

And there’s one more, and possibly the most important: the many, many Canadians who know that this isn’t enough. This doesn’t wash away or excuse the acts of genocide that were done in our name by the governments we elected through the organizations they empowered. The fact that there are so many voices who say we cannot move on without fixing the systemic issues that continue to plague First Nations’ communities, the fact that these people are willing to take a stand, that’s the Canada worth being hopeful for.

I don’t intend to cancel Canada Day, here, because holidays aren’t always days of celebration. People of the Jewish faith have Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. Christians have Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. Islam has Ashura. These are not feast days. These are not days with fireworks. These are days to reflect on our sins and to commit to atoning for those sins and repairing the damage they’ve caused.

On this year, on this day, observing Canada Day as a Day of Atonement seems like the least we could do.

P.S. I’m also spending this afternoon getting my second vaccine shot. That seems appropriate for this day as well.

Space Colonies Group Chat, 2312 CE

This was composed by Eldest Child and Erin after reading over the latest drafts of The Sun Runners, The Cloud Riders, and my short story, The Phases of Jupiter.

This contains spoilers for The Sun Runners, The Cloud Riders, and The Phases of Jupiter, so if you're really not into that thing, turn away now...

Space Colonies Group Chat:

Mercury: OMG! The Earth has collapsed! WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO?
Mars: Capitalist hellscape?
Venus: Zeppelin co-op boards?
Ganymede: Er, guys?
Mercury: So, hypothetically, how would we feel about survival cannibalism?
Ganymede: GUYS!
Asteroid Skows: Right, Venus? Mars? We're moving in!
Venus: Eh, we'll make it work.
Mars: You did hear us say, 'capitalist hellscape', right?
Asteroid Skows: So, Mars: you planning on shooting all of us while we go kamikazi on your biospheres?
Mars: Okay. We'll make it work.
Ganymede: Guys, aliens are real.
Venus: What?
Mars: What?
Mercury: What?

Last (or, rather, latest) Post

I let the 19th anniversary of this blog pass without a post. I haven't had the energy to really add to this blog in quite a while, as most of my time has been spent with my novel writing, and on social media (and, frankly, far too much social media). It's also true that blogs, these days, have become incredibly passe, and the online contacts happen far more on social media, including some platforms I barely understand, but which both my kids are fluent in.

It probably makes more sense to completely rethink this site from the ground up, possibly even launching a clean slate at a different domain (I do own the domain jamesbow.ca). I may do that, but I'm reluctant to just shut this place down, and not just because I may come back the next time I have a book to promote.

I've spent over nineteen years crafting this blog, and it has helped build my skills and confidence as a writer. And, in the early days, the community that this blog gave me access to helped build me up as a person, giving me new friends, and honing my political arguments as well as enhancing my writing skills. You wouldn't expect me to toss out my old photographs, even if most of my new ones are being uploaded directly to my computer, would you?

And as I look back on the old posts, it's remarkable how much the world has developed since those early days, both in good ways or bad. If you want to know where Trump came from, and how idiots defy reality about climate change, vaccines and the need to take precautions during a pandemic, you see some of it in the early days of blogging. I've talked about how various political elements, but particularly those on the hard right, such as with the Republican party, started to value winning over good governance. I've talked about the disturbing rise in eliminationist rhetoric, like "liberal hunting permits", "second amendment actions", and how political actors liken their opponents not as human beings with reasonable disagreements, but as enemies who can't be reasoned with. As traitors. As subhuman.

True, this playbook arguably started picking up in the mid-1990s with Newt Gingrich's "Contract With America" where political compromise was explicitly derided as "selling out", but in certain political blogging circles, this really took root following the 9/11 terrorist attacks, with people questioning the drive for war with Iraq labelled as "objectively pro-Saddam", and people calling for more cautious approaches in Afghanistan accused of supporting terrorists.

Now, the conservative-leaning friends that I know today I gained through blogging. These individuals were exceptional in that they embraced the best of what blogging promised: a democratized-forum where everybody with an opinion had an opportunity to express that opinion and express it well. And they expressed it well. The Canadian political blogosphere encouraged this, somewhat, by lumping Conservative, Liberal, New Democratic and Green supporters together. Though there were associations like the Blogging Tories, many readers and writers mixed pretty freely with the Progressive Bloggers, and my Blogging Alliance of Non-Partisan Canadians was welcomed with open arms.

These friends of mine, conservative and otherwise, now stand back and watch while the crazies dominate the noise. You don't get any sense of camaraderie between political points of view on Twitter; most people either nod or troll. The noise is discouraging, but the friends I've gained are not. They are the big reason why I'm keeping this blog up as, I hope, a testament that blogging had, and has, value.

This is where I'll leave this blog for a little while, barring story ideas that take my fancy, or new events that I need to promote. I'm pretty sure you folks know where else to find me, and I'll see you there.

I Can See Clearly Now...

There are a few reasons why I don't consider 2020 to be the worst year ever. Yes, it has been an extremely challenging time with the pandemic and its associated lockdowns, but it has also been the year where 81 million Americans stood up to Donald Trump and his deplorables. Yes, we have no shortage of anti-mask idiots everywhere, and the root problems that created Trump and his ilk remain, but we were reminded that we also have the ability within us to stand up for what is right. The state of Georgia saw that in 2021.

We've also had some personal successes this year. For Erin and myself, our writing continues. 2020 was bookended with Erin's Governor General's Award for Stand on the Sky on one end (yes, I know, that was December 2019, but the glow carried into the new year) and a TD Canadian Children's Literature Award nomination for the same novel at the other.

Yes, there remains a lot of work to be done with the pandemic, and with dealing with the deplorables in our politics and society, but as we enter 2021, I feel we have a greater possibility of getting those things done, for the better of us all. I certainly wasn't feeling this back at the end of 2016.

2020 was also the year I had my cataract surgery -- thankfully before the COVID-19 epidemic took hold. Indeed, yesterday was the first anniversary of the first of the two surgeries. Early that morning, Erin took me into Cambridge Memorial Hospital, and I took my happy juice drugs and after going under (a very small) knife for just a few minutes, I was able to get to my feet and walk out of the hospital, seeing more clearly through my right eye than I'd ever done in literally years.

I have to say, suddenly realizing that I could read signs on the wall without the need for glasses was a startling moment. Even before the cataracts became obvious, I'd always relied on high-prescription glasses, and the cataracts themselves were turning my vision progressively more blurry and sepia-coloured. The world got so much brighter that day, it seemed like I went from a musty yellow hue to something tinged with blue.

When I learned that I needed cataract surgery back in 2018, and was told that it could fix my eyesight so much I might not need glasses, I was excited, but also a little wary. Glasses had been a part of me since before grade three, and they had become a big part of my self-image. After all, they're on the face that stares out at me whenever I look into a mirror.

As it turns out, I still do need glasses, but only for reading books or looking at my computer screen, or anything that requires me to focus on items up close. I don't need glasses when I'm driving. For a few weeks after the second surgery (my photo above was taken on February 15, 2020, as I passed through Niagara Falls, New York, on the way to Boston -- I am so looking forward to being able to travel again), and while I was able to see what was around me very clearly, I did have some trouble looking at the text on my computer screen. Fortunately, reading glasses helped.

My optometrist did prescribe for me a set of multifocal lenses that corrected my vision at the bottom to look at items up close and left things uncorrected for viewing things from a distance. He called them "grocery store glasses", which saves me from having to whip out a pair while shopping, just so I can look at the labels on the cans I buy. I do appreciate them, and I suspect that Erin and the kids do as well.

While I sometimes miss not being able to see things at the microscopic level by looking at things up close (no more threading needles for me), I do appreciate having the choice to wear or not wear my glasses, as the case might be. And given how bad my eyes were before the surgery, that's a miracle of science.

So, perhaps, being able to see more clearly helps me to see a clearer way forward out of 2020.

What they Ran Out Of

Enclosed is a bit of freewriting I did, within the universe I'm setting up with The Sun Runners and The Cloud Riders. It's short. I hope it's punchy. I hope you like it.

Image by Reimund Bertrams from Pixabay

What they Ran Out Of

Mercury knew it first. When the Earth suspended shuttle service and signed off with "please forgive us," Mercury imported two-thirds of its food. With rations, the average caloric intake dropped to 800 calories per day with no end in sight. There were culls. There were conflicts. There was cannibalism. They needed a miracle.

The Asteroid Miners knew it too, but they had ships. They called every family back to Ceres and Vesta and organized convoys, pooling what food they had, what oxygen. They set out for the nearest two planets that could take them: Mars for Ceres, Venus for Vesta.

Venus had food. They had farms. They'd maintained strict population controls to keep themselves close to self-sufficiency. They still panicked. They'd lost their connection to the homeworld, and they didn't know how to mourn. It took the quick actions of one man to stop the riots, and appeal to everyone's sanity. Venus recovered, though it still mourned.

Mars prepared itself. With food and farms, the largest population and the easiest environment to plunder, it built to become the new prosperous centre of the solar system. It had robot drones to trade with Venus. It kept the dream of a human solar system alive, but with the same doggedness that had condemned the Earth.

The Jupiter Moon outposts had less food than Mercury. They were research stations and speculative ventures, with scientists drilling through the ice looking for life funded by business people looking to cash in on humanity's leap to the outer solar system. They knew they couldn't survive or go home. Europa continued its work and radioed what findings it could. Ganymede did not. They ran out of time. Both went as silent as the Earth.

Beyond the Moons of Jupiter, there were only robots, sending back messages about what they were seeing, to a planet that could no longer hear.

Comments welcome (until they close).

The Year of Hindsight

How is it, I have to ask, that we can witness history in the making and feel almost no compunction to write about it? Is it because, sometimes, history is exhausting? We are living through moments that will be taught in history classes over the next century, but I struggle to find the emotional energy to put even this missive down. Maybe it's a muscle you have to exercise. Exercise is also exhausting.

I realize that I'm privileged and that there are billions of others worse off than me. A writer friend, after yesterday's attempted coup against the legitimate government of the United States of America, threw up her hands and said, essentially, "I teach a course on dystopic fiction. What am I going to do now?" I can see where she's coming from, but there is an answer. It's "Imagine all this is happening, and your water supply is also contaminated. Then bring in speakers from some of those First Nations communities across Canada."

We are now approaching the tenth month anniversary of the unofficial start of the COVID-19 pandemic. There are some glimmers of hope in that vaccines are rolling out, even if they are arriving and being administered far too slowly for everybody's liking. We are now in lockdown again -- something I fully support. Indeed, I have to question the idiocy of contemplating letting the kids go back to school before this month is over. The lockdown was set for four weeks, but it really should be at least six, and be more strictly enforced, so we can make some real progress in our numbers.

That said, I finally figured out how to get my groceries delivered, both from Sobeys and the local stores, so as to reduce my one remaining major point of potential exposure to this virus. And it allowed me to deliver more food than I could reasonably carry, so we're well stocked up before I have to contemplate another food store visit.

Again, that's thanks to my privilege. I know that, as sacrifices go, this is small compared to what others have to deal with. But I do feel good that I'm doing my own part, even as I keep my fingers crossed and consider the things I will do once this pandemic recedes.

It's also the fourth anniversary of my mother's passing. I miss her a lot.

The Last Four Years

You may or may not be surprised to know that I was here when the news came across my phone that more votes had been counted, and Pennsylvania had been called for president-elect Joe Biden, finally putting paid to Donald Trump. This is the northern end of Kipling Avenue, a short stretch of road north of Steeles Avenue that the TTC uses to access a turning loop for its buses. I've been able to cope with the fact that I can't ride public transit anymore, until a COVID vaccine becomes available (fingers crossed!) by occasionally going into my old home town and photographing and videoing public transit vehicles from a socially responsible distance, while wearing a mask.

It felt good to know that Donald Trump had been defeated, and it was especially good to see the joyous reaction throughout Twitter and my Facebook feed. The sun was shining, I was doing something I loved, and nearly 75 million Americans stood up to defeat the nearly 70 million who decided they were okay with the last four years of racist cruelty and flagrant incompetence. A good day, at last.

While I was joyful, I was not overjoyed, perhaps because I had a cautious optimism throughout the week that most Americans were going to do the right thing, and that Trump, in the end a coward as well as a bully, would end with a whimper rather than a bang. Things could still happen to change that, but since the Four Seasons Total Landscaping incident, I'm more confident and optimistic that this will be the case.

This week, however, I've come to realize how much the election four years ago is tied up with more personal bad news that was delivered soon after. This Sunday will be the fourth anniversary of my mother's diagnosis of pancreatic cancer. She passed on January 7, 2017.

So many people have called 2020 a bad year, given the COVID-19 pandemic, that it seems quaint to remember when we thought 2016 was the worst year ever, with the death of celebrities like David Bowie and Leonard Cohen. But Trump's victory in the 2016 election topped all that. And the news of my mother's terminal cancer, for me, topped even that.

It's linked together because she was there when the news hit that Trump had won the presidency. It was a mental and spiritual blow, especially coupled with the news of all of the other incidents of rising nationalist politics throughout the world, from Bolisano to Brexit. The world did seem like it was catching on fire.

My mother passed before Trump actually became president, and while we could never have imagined how bad his presidency was going to be, we knew it would be bad. We knew the next four years were going to be tough.

And now they're over. There's a lot of work to do and a lot of mess to clean up, but at least we now have some hope that adults are in the room working to clean things up. I got to see this. And I'm sad that my mother did not. I wish I could tell her that I got to see this. I wish I could tell her that we made it through. There's still a lot of work to do, but now I have more hope that this work will be done.

At the end of Saturday's transit-fanning, I headed down to Harbourfront Centre, where I first heard the news about my mother four years ago. I wish she got to see this.

The Most Awkward Car Trip Across America

Another question I have about the U.S. Election...

I know Electoral College voters are real people. Back in the day, they were selected to travel across the country to Washington to cast their vote for the President and Vice President. I'm wondering if they still do that, or if, given the pandemic, they'll have to do it by Zoom Meeting.

But my main question has to do with those states (Maine and Nebraska) who divide up their Electoral College votes, awarding two for the winner of the state-wide vote, and one for each congressional district, depending on how each district voted. In Nebraska, Congressional District 2, covering most of Omaha, voted for Biden while the rest of the state went to Trump.

How do they travel to Washington? How awkward is the ride as four Nebraska Republicans and one Nebraska Democrat slip into an SUV and strike out along the I-80? Do the three Maine Democrats stick the Trump Republican in the back of the pick-up truck?

Mauve America

I'll have more serious things to say about the state of the United States and its election shortly. This, however, while slightly tongue in cheek, is still sort of serious.

In talking about America's strutural divide, we often hear references to "red states" and "blue states" based on whether they consistently vote Republican or Democrat. In the handful of states where the balance between the two parties is close to 50-50, we call these swing states "purple states", by mixing the red and the blue.

This amplifies the polarizing effect the American Electoral College has, where (with two exceptions: Maine and Nebraska) it awards votes for the president state by state, with 100% of those votes assigned to the candidate most voters in the state voted for.

Of course, Donald Trump didn't get 100% of the vote in each and every red state. Indeed, in Texas, often considered to be a deep red, nay crimson, state, Joe Biden made a serious challenge, held the lead through a fair chunk of election night, and came away with 48% of that state's votes. Texas is purple, albeit tinged somewhat red.

I wonder if, rather than refer to each state as "red", "blue", or "purple", we should adopt a scale of purpleness to indicate how much to the red and the blue tint each purple state lay?

I had to look at a colour wheel. States which are strictly 50-50 are thus purple, but those that lean 60-40 Democrat start to go indigo? And what about fuschia? Or mauve?

For an overwhelming majority of the country, at least 40% of voters picked Democratic candidates, and labelling these states as "red" is an act of erasure.

PCCs on Kingston Road

Apparently, when we went into this pandemic lockdown, some people thought that they could use the time at home to get creative. I don't know these people, and so I don't know what the hell they were thinking when they thought this. The blog here has languished as I spend my commentary energies on Facebook and Twitter -- that is, when I'm not doomscrolling.

Writing is getting done, however. I'm working on a short story that sits within the universe I'm creating with The Sun Runners and The Cloud Riders, and I continue to work on Transit Toronto. I have submitted grant applications with the Ontario Arts Council which, while they may be long shots, are still better than no shots at all.

I am slowly but steadily working through Richard Glaze's photo collection, and have scanned over 800 photographs, and placed 500 of them on the website. I've also been in touch with transit fans and historians in Ohio and at the Seashore Trolley Museum and shipped off over a thousand slides of American transit operations from the 1950s. The Cincinnati Transit Historical Association is already putting together a presentation on Glaze's material. I haven't been in touch with Richard directly, but his friends have told me that Richard is delighted that his collection is getting out there and being shared and enjoyed.

And recently, I've taken a crack at some of Richard's 16mm film collection. I've opened a box and inventoried about 14100 feet of film (in 141 100-foot reels -- these are four inches in diameter). Digitizing all of this is going to be prohibitively expensive, so I'm considering a Kickstarter to try and raise funds. In the meantime, I'm testing how well the digitization can be, finding a local place to scan a handful of reels in HD. We'll do another test of some other reels to see what they look like in 4K.

The film reels are silent, of course, but they are all of transit operations from the late 1960s into the late 1970s, so I gathered what I could, applied some music from YouTube's Audio Library, and the above is the first of Richard Glaze's movies brought to life. I hope you like it. I certainly enjoyed putting it together.