Last night I took a visitor out for a typical Edmonton evening - a story slam at the Blue Chair Cafe. These happen once a month - 10 writers sign up and they read their 5-minutes-or-fewer story to the crowd. There are 5 volunteer judges in the audience, and the stories get rated. A hat is passed and at the end of the night - voila! The winner gets a cash prize.
Last night's winner was Mark Ramsden, and he happens to be one of my students at MacEwan. I can take no credit for his talents. He isn't in one of my writing classes.
The chocolate mousse turned out to be gluten free and corn free, and it was the perfect topper to an earlier spicy chicken curry soup. The stories were in general palatable, but I was wondering why so many men write about being drunk or on drugs. Do they think the audience finds it as interesting as they do? Not me! I get plenty of exposure to alcoholics around here, so I prefer to hear about something else. Oh, maybe it was the thing to talk about back when drinking/drug culture was seen as the emerging literary force - all that Burroughs and Bukowski et al - which isn't much different from the opium culture of Coleridge's time. In the hands of a good writer, it can be interesting. It's not the content that attracts; it's the skill of the writer. Too many men don't seem to think abut that before they put pen to paper and outline their youthful indiscretions.
At the end of the evening, as everyone was paying their bills and heading out into the half-hearted snowy night, a young man stopped at our table. He had been watching the televised 3-Day Novel series the night before - the episode where one of the judges rapped me for what he saw as racism with regard to something I said to the band in preparation for the reading challenge. The young man wanted to tell me he thought the judge was wrong and that I was robbed. I really appreciated that.
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Saturday, February 17, 2007
One Less Voice
These days I’m paid to go to the big United church at the centre of town: McDougall United. It has a long history of being a centre of political and social influence, but that was in the past. It has come through the waning of the last couple of decades and is starting to grow strong again – and part of that is a refocusing on their purpose. McDougall does a lot with the downtown community – supporting the work of the Bissell Centre and the Edmonton City Centre Church Corporation.
McDougall also has a long history of excellent music, and it used to be a premiere concert venue for the city before the Winspear Centre was built. The acoustics are terrific, and the place is both open and warm. It’s the music ministry that pays me to be there.
I’m the bass section leader. That means I provide an anchor for the volunteer basses in the choir. I help keep it all together and provide leadership. This means I make sure the guys have the right music, that anyone who is having trouble gets a little extra attention. I keep attendance, assign robes to newcomers, and sing the occasional solo piece. At McDougall, the music ranges from Bach to Beatles.
This month is Gospel Music Month – a tribute to the musical heritage of the church as well as coordinating with Black History Month. Our attendance goes up a notch during Gospel Music Month. Maybe it’s the bluegrass band. Maybe it’s the informality of it all. Maybe it’s a nostalgia for a time when we weren’t living in doubt.
I’m the young guy in the bass section. That doesn’t mean a lot. Maybe it’s because the bass voice matures later than the others, but our section is well-lived. We have our challenges: some don’t read music, some are hard of hearing, some are dealing with the pains of growing old. But they come to rehearse every week, and then they show up on Sunday and they give what they have.
Our choir president resigned recently. 70 years old, he’s been singing there for 30 years. He was still singing the occasional solo – and while the voice does not have the robust fierceness of youth, it is still a resonant and sensitive instrument. He has chosen to stop now, before he loses his abilities. He doesn’t want to be an old man singing out of tune and out of time.
He has stepped down now, in Gospel Music Month, when the choir is more informal and when his absence won’t be felt as keenly. I might be the paid section leader, but he’s the man who has been the backbone of the section for decades. I miss him already.
So Dave, if you read this, know that your years of singing brought joy and pleasure to hundreds of people. Thank you.
McDougall also has a long history of excellent music, and it used to be a premiere concert venue for the city before the Winspear Centre was built. The acoustics are terrific, and the place is both open and warm. It’s the music ministry that pays me to be there.
I’m the bass section leader. That means I provide an anchor for the volunteer basses in the choir. I help keep it all together and provide leadership. This means I make sure the guys have the right music, that anyone who is having trouble gets a little extra attention. I keep attendance, assign robes to newcomers, and sing the occasional solo piece. At McDougall, the music ranges from Bach to Beatles.
This month is Gospel Music Month – a tribute to the musical heritage of the church as well as coordinating with Black History Month. Our attendance goes up a notch during Gospel Music Month. Maybe it’s the bluegrass band. Maybe it’s the informality of it all. Maybe it’s a nostalgia for a time when we weren’t living in doubt.
I’m the young guy in the bass section. That doesn’t mean a lot. Maybe it’s because the bass voice matures later than the others, but our section is well-lived. We have our challenges: some don’t read music, some are hard of hearing, some are dealing with the pains of growing old. But they come to rehearse every week, and then they show up on Sunday and they give what they have.
Our choir president resigned recently. 70 years old, he’s been singing there for 30 years. He was still singing the occasional solo – and while the voice does not have the robust fierceness of youth, it is still a resonant and sensitive instrument. He has chosen to stop now, before he loses his abilities. He doesn’t want to be an old man singing out of tune and out of time.
He has stepped down now, in Gospel Music Month, when the choir is more informal and when his absence won’t be felt as keenly. I might be the paid section leader, but he’s the man who has been the backbone of the section for decades. I miss him already.
So Dave, if you read this, know that your years of singing brought joy and pleasure to hundreds of people. Thank you.
Friday, January 26, 2007
Raw Fish and Minister Faust
Last night was the preview of BookTelevision's 3-Day Novel reality television series. I'd like to say everyone was there - but you know it's not true. O hyperbole, thou'rt fallen on hard times! There were quite a few of the contestants - Darren, Ali, Mar'ce, Wayne, Tyler, and me. And all the fab folks from BookTV were there, as well as the fab folks from Chapters. Some of them didn't have much choice, since the event was held IN Chapters, but it was good to see them. Chef Kyla was there, and (electro)Lucy for pet therapy.
And Minister Faust, one of the judges. Minister Faust made a point of saying that his way of helping a conflict situation (his judging) return to normal is to give people room; that some of the contestants may have thought he didn't like them because he kept his distance.
Ah, yes. One can see how they might think that. Or it might have been the things he said about them.
Chapters gave us presents! So did BookTV - including a set of collector cards with gum. These things are very cool. And the spread had several celiac-friendly goodies: smoked salmon, sushi, fruit, cheese. In abundance! I can't be angry with anyone when there's raw fish in the offing. Besides, Minister Faust likes the work of Daniel Keyes - and Keyes' Minds of Billy Milligan changed my life. And I like the Minister's blog. So maybe we can forge an understanding. Over sushi.
I missed Catherine Ford, who was sunning herself in warmer climes while we basked in the northern limelights.
The powers that be won't reveal the winner of the television competition until they film the finale in March.
As I was putting my coat on in the room where the 12 contestants slept last September, I noticed a binder labelled Loss Prevention Manual. Oh, the temptation! The opportunity for irony! I had a bag full of presents already - who would notice an extra bulge?
Did I? Of course not! It would be wrong.
And Minister Faust, one of the judges. Minister Faust made a point of saying that his way of helping a conflict situation (his judging) return to normal is to give people room; that some of the contestants may have thought he didn't like them because he kept his distance.
Ah, yes. One can see how they might think that. Or it might have been the things he said about them.
Chapters gave us presents! So did BookTV - including a set of collector cards with gum. These things are very cool. And the spread had several celiac-friendly goodies: smoked salmon, sushi, fruit, cheese. In abundance! I can't be angry with anyone when there's raw fish in the offing. Besides, Minister Faust likes the work of Daniel Keyes - and Keyes' Minds of Billy Milligan changed my life. And I like the Minister's blog. So maybe we can forge an understanding. Over sushi.
I missed Catherine Ford, who was sunning herself in warmer climes while we basked in the northern limelights.
The powers that be won't reveal the winner of the television competition until they film the finale in March.
As I was putting my coat on in the room where the 12 contestants slept last September, I noticed a binder labelled Loss Prevention Manual. Oh, the temptation! The opportunity for irony! I had a bag full of presents already - who would notice an extra bulge?
Did I? Of course not! It would be wrong.
Sunday, January 21, 2007
Hopeless mission
So last night we were both at our computers engrossed in schoolwork (after midnight on a weekend no less) when the dog started yipping. She was sitting on a chair and facing the front door. We told her to be quiet and went back to our tasks. A minute later, there was a man at the doorway to the office.
He hadn't rung the bell or knocked, and this was one of the rare occasions when we didn't have the alarm set. He had walked in. He was looking for help, he said. He wanted blankets because the shelters were full and he was going to sleep outdoors in sheltered corner beside the entrance to the Ashton apartments. He was with his girlfriend.
"She has a wooden leg..." he said. I went to the door - which he had left wide open - and across the street I could see a shopping cart. Big blue plastic kind. And on the bottom level, where you'd put heavy flat things like bags of rice or kitty litter, there was a body all curled up. He'd been wheeling her around like that.
"It's warm in here," he said.
It's not the first time we've had uninvited guests. I came out of the bathroom downstairs once to find a woman looking at stuff in my livingroom. When I asked what she thought she was doing, she said "Just checking it out." That was in the summer and during the day, not the middle of the night in January. And there are a lot of people in our part of town who come from communities where no-one locks the door and you just walk in. It's not an invasion; it's just that boundaries are different in the towns these folks come from.
Our current visitor was a bit worse for drink. This made him behave like our arthritic one-eyed cat. He would open the door and sniff the air, turn back inside and say "It's nice and warm in here." And the door would still be wide open.
He'd left muddy shoeprints on the tiles in the music room. While my partner went to find spare blankets, I called the Hope Mission to see if they had any beds. I tried to get our visitor to stay put - and he probably thought my concern was for our stuff. Our house is full of interesting stuff - art and books and glass and ceramics. But I knew he wasn't likely to take any of the stuff. What would he do with it? No, I wanted him to stay put so I wouldn't have to spend more time cleaning the floor again. I'd just washed them all a few days ago.
The Hope Mission said they had plenty of mats and our visitors would be welcome. The Mission is only a few blocks away.
"You got something to eat?"
We had spent all day making sausages. We'd made two kinds: a pre-cooked kind with rice and assorted meats (goose, deer, turkey) and a raw kind. So my other half nuked some of the pre-cooked ones while I chatted to our visitor. He wasn't too happy with the phone call to the Hope Mission. I asked him how they found themselves in this situation.
"Don't ask about that," he said.
"You have a problem," I said, "and you want to make it MY problem, so I figure I have a right to ask." Hey, when you want something from a writer, there's a toll booth: cough up the story.
"So where are you from?" I asked.
"My mother."
A comedian.
"You got anything to eat?"
"We're getting you something. Sausages - we made them today. They're good - rice, meat. You'll like them."
"You got any socks?" he asked.
"On my feet." Two comedians. I went to see if my partner needed any help in the kitchen.
He wandered into the kitchen, tracking dirty snow through the livingroom and hallway. He didn't want the sausages. "They don't look right," meaning they don't look like the ones from the store. "You got anything else?" We didn't, really. We had used all the salad, had no fresh vegetables, and all our odds and ends of meat had gone into the sausages. We had dined on the leftover sausage meat.
"Pork...sausage...doesn't sound right."
"Maybe you should bring your friend in for a few minutes."
"She's got a wooden leg."
It wasn't a non-sequitur. The an building our deck started it last May and still hasn't come back with the railings, so the steps aren't safe for anyone who isn't confident of their balance.
We offered a ride to the Mission. He took the blankets instead. I understood this in a way - the shelters in town are segregated, so he wouldn't be sleeping with his girlfriend. So he took the beige comforter and an old red wool blanket that belonged to my partner's grandmother. He left before we could pack the sausages up.
He got his girlfriend out of the shopping cart and half carried her to the corner where they thought they might spend the night. He spread the blanket and comforter over them. My partner took them the sausages. All our visitor said was "You got any warmer blankets?"
My partner called the Hope Mission to see if their van could pick the couple up, but they only send the van if EMS asks for it. So my partner called the police and asked that they check on these folks. I washed the floors.
They did. After 5 a.m. A police car came and rousted the couple from their spot, making them pick up their blankets and move along. Just as the night was reaching its coldest.
Do I feel guilty? No. We provided good food, warm blankets. We found a bed for the night and offered transportation. Our uninvited guest wanted more. He felt completely comfortable walking into our home, asking for things, and then complaining that he wanted better. I wasn't looking for gratitude; it has always irked me that food and shelter aren't free. But he was rude, tracked dirt all over, lied about the shelters being full.
I still want to know the story, though.
He hadn't rung the bell or knocked, and this was one of the rare occasions when we didn't have the alarm set. He had walked in. He was looking for help, he said. He wanted blankets because the shelters were full and he was going to sleep outdoors in sheltered corner beside the entrance to the Ashton apartments. He was with his girlfriend.
"She has a wooden leg..." he said. I went to the door - which he had left wide open - and across the street I could see a shopping cart. Big blue plastic kind. And on the bottom level, where you'd put heavy flat things like bags of rice or kitty litter, there was a body all curled up. He'd been wheeling her around like that.
"It's warm in here," he said.
It's not the first time we've had uninvited guests. I came out of the bathroom downstairs once to find a woman looking at stuff in my livingroom. When I asked what she thought she was doing, she said "Just checking it out." That was in the summer and during the day, not the middle of the night in January. And there are a lot of people in our part of town who come from communities where no-one locks the door and you just walk in. It's not an invasion; it's just that boundaries are different in the towns these folks come from.
Our current visitor was a bit worse for drink. This made him behave like our arthritic one-eyed cat. He would open the door and sniff the air, turn back inside and say "It's nice and warm in here." And the door would still be wide open.
He'd left muddy shoeprints on the tiles in the music room. While my partner went to find spare blankets, I called the Hope Mission to see if they had any beds. I tried to get our visitor to stay put - and he probably thought my concern was for our stuff. Our house is full of interesting stuff - art and books and glass and ceramics. But I knew he wasn't likely to take any of the stuff. What would he do with it? No, I wanted him to stay put so I wouldn't have to spend more time cleaning the floor again. I'd just washed them all a few days ago.
The Hope Mission said they had plenty of mats and our visitors would be welcome. The Mission is only a few blocks away.
"You got something to eat?"
We had spent all day making sausages. We'd made two kinds: a pre-cooked kind with rice and assorted meats (goose, deer, turkey) and a raw kind. So my other half nuked some of the pre-cooked ones while I chatted to our visitor. He wasn't too happy with the phone call to the Hope Mission. I asked him how they found themselves in this situation.
"Don't ask about that," he said.
"You have a problem," I said, "and you want to make it MY problem, so I figure I have a right to ask." Hey, when you want something from a writer, there's a toll booth: cough up the story.
"So where are you from?" I asked.
"My mother."
A comedian.
"You got anything to eat?"
"We're getting you something. Sausages - we made them today. They're good - rice, meat. You'll like them."
"You got any socks?" he asked.
"On my feet." Two comedians. I went to see if my partner needed any help in the kitchen.
He wandered into the kitchen, tracking dirty snow through the livingroom and hallway. He didn't want the sausages. "They don't look right," meaning they don't look like the ones from the store. "You got anything else?" We didn't, really. We had used all the salad, had no fresh vegetables, and all our odds and ends of meat had gone into the sausages. We had dined on the leftover sausage meat.
"Pork...sausage...doesn't sound right."
"Maybe you should bring your friend in for a few minutes."
"She's got a wooden leg."
It wasn't a non-sequitur. The an building our deck started it last May and still hasn't come back with the railings, so the steps aren't safe for anyone who isn't confident of their balance.
We offered a ride to the Mission. He took the blankets instead. I understood this in a way - the shelters in town are segregated, so he wouldn't be sleeping with his girlfriend. So he took the beige comforter and an old red wool blanket that belonged to my partner's grandmother. He left before we could pack the sausages up.
He got his girlfriend out of the shopping cart and half carried her to the corner where they thought they might spend the night. He spread the blanket and comforter over them. My partner took them the sausages. All our visitor said was "You got any warmer blankets?"
My partner called the Hope Mission to see if their van could pick the couple up, but they only send the van if EMS asks for it. So my partner called the police and asked that they check on these folks. I washed the floors.
They did. After 5 a.m. A police car came and rousted the couple from their spot, making them pick up their blankets and move along. Just as the night was reaching its coldest.
Do I feel guilty? No. We provided good food, warm blankets. We found a bed for the night and offered transportation. Our uninvited guest wanted more. He felt completely comfortable walking into our home, asking for things, and then complaining that he wanted better. I wasn't looking for gratitude; it has always irked me that food and shelter aren't free. But he was rude, tracked dirt all over, lied about the shelters being full.
I still want to know the story, though.
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Making the Grade
Labour Day weekend 2006 I left the cosy confines of Boyle Street and let myself be shut into a bookstore in the south end of town for the first ever television version of the 3-Day Novel Contest. Before I went, I spent a few hours wandering around my neighbourhood and making notes about the place.
So I wrote a novella set in my neighbourhood. It's fiction - none of the characters are real people, but they are based on real situations. There's the homeless Cree woman who showers under the outdoor tap outside my kitchen window. And the do-gooder United Church intern minister from suburban Ontario. And the gang of kids looking for homeless people to beat up. And the hookers and dealers and dog walkers and cat ladies. The bars, the park, the cemetery int he river valley.
Got word on Monday that the book didn't win the big International 3-Day Novel Contest based inVancouver - but it DID make the shortlist. We still don't know who won the television version of the contest, and I suppose we won't know until March when they shoot the final episode of what has become an 8-part series.
I spent a couple of hours in November serving lunch at the Bissell Centre as a volunteer. So many hungry people. People rotated through, some of them lining up over and over so they could amass enough sandwiches to take back to family or to keep them through another meal. We shovelled out those sandwiches as quickly as we could, and I kept trying to stifle that voice that said "What's really happening here?" because at the end of the day, all that's happening is this: people with enough food are sharing. Yes, I could care more about the root causes of poverty and hunger - and maybe I should, because as a celiac if I ever find myself relying on the Bissell Centre for lunches I'm going to have a rough time! But there's no point trying to fix someone's life when the immediate need is to make sure they don't starve.
The best news was hearing that the number of after hours requests for water at the Bissell Centre has dropped dramatically since we turned the tap on outside our house. As starving artists we can't really afford it, but where did the public water fountains go? When they redid Churchill Square? When they redid Giovanni Caboto Park? When they renovated Edmonton Centre Mall? Why are we begrudging people access to water and food?
So I wrote a novella set in my neighbourhood. It's fiction - none of the characters are real people, but they are based on real situations. There's the homeless Cree woman who showers under the outdoor tap outside my kitchen window. And the do-gooder United Church intern minister from suburban Ontario. And the gang of kids looking for homeless people to beat up. And the hookers and dealers and dog walkers and cat ladies. The bars, the park, the cemetery int he river valley.
Got word on Monday that the book didn't win the big International 3-Day Novel Contest based inVancouver - but it DID make the shortlist. We still don't know who won the television version of the contest, and I suppose we won't know until March when they shoot the final episode of what has become an 8-part series.
I spent a couple of hours in November serving lunch at the Bissell Centre as a volunteer. So many hungry people. People rotated through, some of them lining up over and over so they could amass enough sandwiches to take back to family or to keep them through another meal. We shovelled out those sandwiches as quickly as we could, and I kept trying to stifle that voice that said "What's really happening here?" because at the end of the day, all that's happening is this: people with enough food are sharing. Yes, I could care more about the root causes of poverty and hunger - and maybe I should, because as a celiac if I ever find myself relying on the Bissell Centre for lunches I'm going to have a rough time! But there's no point trying to fix someone's life when the immediate need is to make sure they don't starve.
The best news was hearing that the number of after hours requests for water at the Bissell Centre has dropped dramatically since we turned the tap on outside our house. As starving artists we can't really afford it, but where did the public water fountains go? When they redid Churchill Square? When they redid Giovanni Caboto Park? When they renovated Edmonton Centre Mall? Why are we begrudging people access to water and food?
Monday, November 20, 2006
Welcome
Boyle Street isn't really a street at all anymore. The streets all had their names taken away decades ago, and they were given numbers instead. So Boyle Street is an area - a gritty, tough area. This is where the halfway houses go and no-one complains because they spruce up the neighbourhood. A roominghouse fire is urban renewal. And the gangs are busy picking off people they think are surplus to requirements, people they think are homeless or hopeless. I have no big plans for this blog - it's just where I get to sing the Boyle Street blues.
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