“Lock up your libraries if you like; but there is no gate, no lock, no bolt that you can set upon the freedom of my mind.” — Virginia Woolf
Boxing Day 2020 It was a clear day. Warm for a city not too far south of the prairie taiga. The temperature had risen to just below freezing. This walk with Helen wound its way through Riverdale along the river. We stopped to investigate a perfectly round hole in a hollow tree, the work of… Continue reading Pandemic Journal 8/1/2021 – Simone de Bébé
Stuck inside a pandemic at a moment when the monolith south of the border is dominated by a fascist, it is sometimes hard to focus on the view up close - the provincial politics that undermine our well-being, the city politics that juggle a budget vulnerable to COVID effects and a vengeful governing provincial party that hates our progressive voting patterns. Sometimes it is hard to sleep.
Sign the petition here: https://www.change.org/EdmontonMandateMasks2HelpStopCovid19 IMMEDIATELY MANDATE MASKS IN EDMONTON.WE ARE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER AND MUST CARE FOR OUR COMMUNITY. Albertans face an uptick in cases of COVID-19 in mid-July. The majority of these new cases cannot be traced to a particular source. Therefore contact tracing is impossible in many instances. We are all… Continue reading Pandemic Journal 21/7/2020 – Please Sign My Petition: IMMEDIATELY MANDATE MASKS IN EDMONTON
Summer in the city bricolage: masks and masculinity, two gardens, a nearby beach, a Chinese grocery, a market, and David Suzuki
When the local florist, calls while you are in the bath to say they have hidden something behind your porch chair.... You discover a message from your beloved daughter.
By day, I count the inequities now underscored and bathed in broad daylight by pandemic effects. The youth with no future. The aged warehoused in dead zones. The mothers whose workday suddenly expands with childcare, teaching, and at-home paid labour. For instance, in my old haunt - the university, academic women’s publications have fallen off precipitously since COVID-19 appeared. The pandemic operates like a magnifying glass of injustices. ...Once I went for walks in the ravine. Now I listen to the rain from underneath the covers. The monsoon that is late May and sometimes June promises to go on through the summer. My psychic drama.
No Gate No Lock 