As many of you know, I’ve been engaged in a running feud with Canadian literary legend Margaret Atwood for quite some time now.

Typically, the landscape for this war has been social media and chance encounters in our shared neighbourhood of Toronto, but about a month or so ago my mother

turned up the weird by writing Atwood a letter of apology on behalf of my family (  http://michaelmurray.ca/my-mothers-letter-to-margaret-atwood ), as I had refused to so so myself. After a few weeks had passed without my mother getting a response, she wrote to Atwood again:

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Nov, 9, 2017

Dear Ms. Atwood:

Hi, how are you?

I am fine, but oh, my sinuses were just awful last week! I don’t know what it was, maybe a change in the barometric pressure or the wind, but honest to Betsy, I just wanted to climb under a rock and die! Even chewing gum was excruciating! It’s at such times when you really need a friend– just so you know that people care and that they’re grateful for all the little things you do for them, like sending hand-sanitizer because you don’t want them to pick up a nasty sinus bug like you did. By the way, did you get the hand-sanitizer I sent to you? I hope so, but you never know with the post office!

Have you got all your Christmas shopping done? I don’t even know where to begin, I’m still trying to catch up on all my cards from last year!

Oh, I think I hear Frito meowing!

That can only mean one thing—he wants his dinner, so I better go!

Yours sincerely,

Barb Murray

PS: In case you did’t know, you can now get a flu shot at Shopper’s so you don’t have to go through all the bother of going to a doctor’s office!

Nov, 13, 2017

Dear Ms. Atwood:

I know that you are a very important person and are probably very busy with your various hobbies and commitments, but that’s still no excuse for being rude! I don’t know how you were raised or what sort of morals you Hollywood types have, but where I come from you write a thank-you note if somebody sends you some hand-sanitizer. It’s just common decency.

I hope you remembered to buy a poppy this Remembrance Day. My father fought in WW II.

In the trenches. There was no hand-sanitizer there. Just death and foot disease. But my father endured all that hardship to help make the world safe for people like you, so I hope you always keep in mind the sacrifices he made for you.

I have been thinking a little more about my son’s behaviour toward you. It’s true that Michael has his issues, but I always taught him to be considerate. If you drop him off at a bar,  he will thank you, and if he gets a present, you can be sure he will send a thank-you note to the person who sent him the hand-sanitizer. Sometimes when he’s tired or anxious or hasn’t been attending his low carb support group meetings, he can get very crabby, so it’s crucial for him, and all of us, to maintain our routines (especially regular BM’s!) and get plenty of sleep.

Looking forward to hearing from you soon,

Barb Murray

PS: I have included an article that I clipped from the paper that I thought you might be interested in on Vitamin D. It’s very important that we get enough of it, especially in winter. Osteoporosis is a silent killer. I was a nurse, so I know.

PPS: Did you get many trick-or-treaters for Halloween? We only got two, and they were both teenage girls! And the way they were dressed, my Lord! I thought I should be handing out clothes instead of candy!

PPS: Do you have any children or were you barren?

It’s as if the adult world has been rendered small, simple and fun, and as we boarded the ferry for the three minute journey to the airport, we felt like children getting on a ride at the CNE. It was first thing in the morning and a dense fog hung mysteriously around us, covering everything.

We could not see where we were going, and this created an atmosphere of adventure and whimsy, and in this context all the businessmen looked particularly ridiculous. Each one of them in a suit that suggested the distance between the corporate status to which they aspired and the disappointing status that they’d actually been assigned, they sat in isolated, self-important concentration. Brows furrowed over spread sheets and columns of data, their too-large fingers hunted-and-pecked on miniature keypads, and it was all a little heart-breaking. Like kids pretending at being adults, they attempted to project that what they were doing was of vital importance, but you could tell that inside they all knew better.

Inside they still wanted to discover a waterfall.
Swim with a knife clenched between their teeth.
Find the hidden treasure.

To our son Jones, who is nearly two, everything is a wonder. He is on the edge of language, and his words, mysterious and uncontainable, are still holier than ours. Excited, almost breathless, he exploded onto the ferry with bright, astonished eyes. He ran around pointing, naming everything he saw. The businessmen all kept their heads down—there was important work to be done—but an older couple watched, smiling as this new world broke into day around our son, aware they were in the midst of a tiny God now bringing his universe into being.

There’s always one just-past-middle-aged man– usually with long grey hair pulled back into a pony tail or up into a samurai knot– executing some interpretation of a martial art using a huge wooden stick or some such. Whenever I see one of these men I am forced to imagine their apartment, and I do not like that. I do not like the fabrics and odours and screensavers

that puts in my head, and so I’ve always kept a kind of hostile distance from them.

Our park, the park where we take our son Jones to play every day, has one of these guys. He is pudgy, dresses all in black, and looks like somebody whose life had been taken over by Columbine ninja fantasies a long time ago.

As such, I have not yet chatted with him, and have chosen instead to make fun of him behind his back. However, since my completion of pulmonary rehabilitation I have hired a personal trainer and I now work-out in this park, which brings me in direct competition with the Columbine ninja for the creepiest man in the park. Yesterday, he was stationed, with his collection of magic sticks, by the bench where I now work out.

This is the conversation that took place:

Me: Hey there, what are you up to!?

Columbine Ninja: ( Continues his maneuvers without saying a word.)

Me: I’m about to work-out. Here. By this bench. This one here. Is that okay with you?

Columbine Ninja: (Raises one hand to shush me)

Me: (Begins to pull out resistance bands from a Shopper’s Drug Mart bag)

Columbine Ninja: You must never disturb a warrior when he is training.

Me: Are you a warrior?

Columbine Ninja: ( Does a maneuver with his big stick, strikes the branch of a tree)

Me: Nice.

Columbine Ninja: The true warrior is invisible to those who cannot see.

Me: Yes, of course, I should have known that.

Columbine Ninja: Not all who wander are lost.

Me: Are you a part-time life coach or something?

Columbine Ninja: I am a student, not the master.

Me: Uber driver?

Columbine Ninja: I am a student of Kenjutsu!

Me: I think you work at a weed dispensary.

Columbine Ninja: Anata wa seik? shite imasu.

Me: What was that, Klingon? That doesn’t impress me in the least.

Columbine Ninja: I wonder why it is that you have trouble breathing? Is it because you fear life? I think you are a scared man. In Kenjutsu they teach you how to control your breathing, how to master your fear before it masters you!

Me: I only have one lung.

Columbine Ninja: And all you need in order to live a failed life is one excuse.

And then the Columbine Ninja just walked away and I commenced the most melancholy work-out in history.

Excellent form, though.

Here is one of the columns I just found while cleaning out an old box:

Q: There’s a girl in my Latin class who I’m absolutely nuts about. Should I tell her?

A: NO, THERE IS NO WAY ON EARTH THAT YOU SHOULD TELL HER!! (Is it Marie-France Lapoint? She is CRAZY hot, especially in those green cords!!! Drool!!!)

Look, this girl who may or may not be Marie-France Lapoint, is probably completely out of your league and dating a guy who lives in Europe or goes to university in the States. You should spare yourself the humiliation of rejection and just wait for her to notice you and your totally cool sweater.

It’s not always easy to do this, but it’s ESSENTIAL that you try. Look at her all the time, but pretend like she’s not important to you because you’re popular and your family is rich. Your indifference will make her think there’s something wrong with her, and this insecurity will probably make her try to be nice to you, and when this happens you should still play it really cool, like you would never have a crush on somebody like her but you’ll talk to her in boring, old Latin, and then when she gets really, really hammered at a party you should make your move!! The master has spoken.

Q: My parents want me to take Computer Science but I think it’s a stupid waste of time. What do you think?

A: First of all, parents are useless. They’re completely embarrassing and don’t understand anything! Of course Computer Science is a waste of time!! Fortran and Cobol?

They sound like robot names! Only nerds take that class and they’re not learning anything important or fun. Rest assured, the world is not going to be run by Cobol and Fortran. However, I do think that computers are going to be really important, one day giving us instant access to pictures of naked women (Kim Basinger and Jamie Lee Curtis!!) and sports scores.

Computers will be like libraries, only they’ll be small and with you all the time, like on Star Trek, but things are going to move so quickly in the future that studying something like Fortran in 1983 isn’t going to do you any good at all. Ignore your parents and take gym or something cool and remember, don’t hangout with any phonies!

Q: If I want to appear of age in a bar, what drink should I order?

A: A Screwdriver. And wear a Harris Tweed hat.

The master has spoken!

A kind of stillness presides, an unhurried ease and absence of pretence. Nobody we saw was lost into the world of their iPhone like so many people in Toronto appear to be, all of them attempting to project a narrative of velocity and importance to the strangers passing by. No, the conversations here came slow and easy– almost humidly– as if each encounter were expected to last weeks rather than seconds.

While in a somewhat matronly dress shop I overheard the two middle-aged women who worked there talking.

“ John keeps crashing the truck into the barn.”

“Lordy!”

“I know! He hasn’t done any damage yet, but geez, it’s only a matter of time.”

“You gotta paint a big, red stop sign on that barn, I tell you. You have to stop that man!”

On the street a woman of about 25, pretty but wounded, approached us and asked for some change. She gestured to her loose fitting denim shirt, “I’m pregnant and hungry.” Seeing her moving toward us I had already decided that if I had change in my pocket I would give some to her, but if I had to dig into my laptop bag, I would not. This was the calculus I had made, the line I had arbitrarily drawn in the sand. After checking my pockets I apologized to her, telling her I didn’t have any change and she trembled, about to cry.  Rachelle then dug into her purse and gave her a couple of dollars, as regardless of this woman’s articulated circumstance, her need, for whatever reason, was more immediate and real than our own.

Cutting through a park near a church we passed a group of about a dozen people seated in a circle on the shaded grass. One man, probably around 35, sat elevated from the rest in a lawn chair that might have been bought at a Canadian Tire in the 1980s. He looked a bit like Jesus, this man, and the resemblance didn’t seem accidental. Leaning back in his chair, he nodded beatifically as the people around him brought him their troubles. A 50 year-old, a round and pale dad wearing a floppy Tilley hat, frustrated, was speaking with his hands, “It seems that the kids today are so remote from both their parents and God, all they ever do is play video games and I worry about this disconnect.” Canadian Tire Jesus put his finger to his lips, composing a thought, while the young girls sitting in this circle of faith watched him so closely, their eyes shining with something they couldn’t quite put into words.

“Do you have air conditioning?” I asked.

“Dah,” he responded in a blunt, unfriendly East European accent.

“Would you mind turning it on, please?”

“It is expensive for me to run AC, it take more energy, you know? So I keep windows open for breeze, OK?”

“Look, I’m sorry, but I’m dying in this heat, and the regulations say that you have to turn it on if the customer asks for it, right?”

The driver, irritated, snorted.

“What?” I asked, also irritated.

“You are weak, little man who can’t take sunshine?”

“Yes, that’s right. I am a weak, little man who can’t take the sunshine,” I sighed.

The driver pretended to laugh, shook his head and said something in a language that I presumed to be Russian.

“Have it your way, little mister boss.”

He then powered up the windows and contemptuously snapped on the AC.

We drove in black silence for the next five minutes.

I hated his fucking guts.

I hoped his native country got obliterated at the Olympics.

Food poisoning.

Nightmares with toys.

No Internet.

Being dunked-on while playing pick-up.

All these pestilences I wished upon him.

As I sat there concentrating my hatred, I began to pick at my fingernails. This is a habit that manifests when I’m angry, and in this case I managed to peel off several crescents of nails, which I then stored in my pocket. This detritus felt disgusting so I opened the window and tried to throw them out of the car.

The driver, his furious eyes staring at me from the rear-view mirror, shouted, “You demand AC like little dictator and now you put window down! You have no manners in my home! You waste my money, it is now five dollars extra!”

“C’mon, don’t be such a prick, I was just throwing a piece of fingernail out the window. Would you rather I left if on the seat?”

“You are disgusting man.”

“Like you’ve never picked at your fingernails.”

“You know who you are? You are like Gollum from The Hobbit. That is you.”

“That tattoo of a bear you have on the back of your neck looks gay.”

The driver slammed on the brakes.

“Gollum throw body waste out of my car, I throw Gollum out of my car. Get out now or I break you into pieces.”

“Really, are you serious?”

The driver looked at me, his eyes softening.

“Maybe I am not myself. My boy is sick and the doctors say he might lose hearing. It is awful and I cannot sleep, imaging his world without music, and then people like you come in and complain about small, small thing and I blow top. You be quiet and sit still, say nothing and I will take you home, but remember, say nothing!”

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Heidi never have resume. Always rely on looks, reputation and friends to get Heidi job, but world change! Now must be Linkedin and able to navigate social media! Heidi decide it time to make resume!

Heidi Resume

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Heidi.

Heidi good dog.

Very, very good dog.

Heidi very fast dog with excellent fetch skills. Can chase ball, cat, squirrel or flying two-leg cheat animal. When Heidi catch, Heidi show no mercy! Heidi kill and tear, Heidi Alpha! But in right situation, Heidi work well with pack, no have to be Alpha even though Alpha. Heidi facilitator, ambassador of self-esteem who always make pack stronger! Heidi versatile.

Heidi great at digging!

Heidi almost six and in her prime.

Heidi fixed.

Heidi good dog.

Very, very good dog.

Important for employer to understand Heidi barking skills. Heidi bark like war bomb explosion! Heidi bark like dinner bowl falling from great height! Heidi never stop! Heidi provide first-rate security for all employment needs! Heidi smell and hear anything, then barkbarkbarkbark!! Heidi fierce, mother of dragons!

Heidi hate cats. No work with cats. Cats deal breaker for Heidi.

Heidi have good appetite. Try anything! Be very good food critic. Here sample of Heidi work:

“Meat lasagna good! Heidi eat fast and lick plate! Four star!”

“French fry limp and without texture. Hit all wrong notes for Heidi. Where meat?!”

(More samples available upon request.)

Heidi very committed to all projects she start and always see it through. Heidi once chase moth in den of two-leggers for three days until Heidi kill and eat moth. Heidi extraordinary bug hunter. Talk of reality TV show, Heidi: Bug Hunter!! but fell through because Heidi agent stupid two-leg with ugly face!!

Special Achievements:

Heidi won New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest and was featured on Cute Overload. Heidi capture and kill bat.

Hobbies and Interests:

Squeak toys, scavenging, religion, bugs and conspiracy theories.

References:

Rusty.

Banjo.

Rex.

Heidi not all bark no bite.

Heid bite and bark.

Heidi real deal.

You be crazy not to hire Heidi.

Heidi make your tail wag!

“Chef, what’s the most important attribute for a young person to have to succeed in the hospitality industry?”

“Chef, would you recommend practical experience working or a diploma for those hoping to enter the restaurant field?”

Stuff like that.

This is the question I sent in:

“What is the absolute worst, most explosive, blood-thirsty battle you ever had in a kitchen?  I once had a bowl of Cheerios broken over my head. Sugar really hurts when it finds it’s way into an open wound.”

I should also let you know that the Chef decided who sent in the best question, with that person winning a $50 gift certificate to his restaurant.

Naturally, I expected to win, but I did not, receiving this email from the host of the event:

“Mike:

The Chef thought your question was stupid and that you were just looking for attention. He said people like you are “all hat, no cattle,” and awarded the gift certificate to Meredith, who used several Italian phrases in her query.”

Clearly, the Chef was an insecure moron. My question was obviously the best and he probably just couldn’t take another Alpha Male in the chat room, and so I sent him this letter:

Chef Dong:

You are stupid (on so many levels) to award Meredith the gift certificate based on her question from Wednesday’s chat. Really, all it takes to impress you are a few Italian phrases? How does this one work?

Siete una ferita aperta scopante.

Nice, eh?

No matter, I’m not writing to address the absurd injustice of your decision or extract revenge for your insults, but to warn you about Meredith. She is a bringer of cockroaches. She keeps a couple in a urine sample jar she hides in her purse and at an opportune moment during her meal she will release them, usually sticking them in a salad or some other vegetable that other diners will suspect came from Mexico.

She will kick up a big fuss, yelling and perhaps even fainting. I once saw her take off a high heel shoe and start banging it on the table pretending to try to kill this pet cockroach. She does this so that you, in a blind panic, will comp her meal and give her a free liter of house wine. You invite the darkness by awarding her the gift certificate for her stupid question. She is a curse. The sun will hide for years if she wins this contest.

There is still time to reconsider, so reconsider.

Michael Murray

In March, over 200, 000 students marched in the streets of Montreal. That’s an awful lot of people, and it warrants some respectful consideration. Personally, when students protest I pay attention. I’m middle-aged now, and I like to know what they think, how they experience the rapidly evolving world, to which we (those generations that came of age before the Internet) are cultural migrants. Because of this, I try to move toward them when it comes to understanding an issue, I want to see it through their eyes rather than try to get them to see it through the eyes of my peers. I want to understand where they’re coming from rather than tell them where they’re going, and I do this for all sorts of reasons, but primarily because I think it will make me a better, more empathetic person.

In the last 15 years the world has changed more than it has in all the centuries it was built upon. The Internet is a more important invention than the wheel, and it’s entirely reasonable to assume that the model by which we’ve successfully lived for 100 years, might not be the model by which we’ll successfully live for the next 100 years. The seeds of a movement like Occupy, that seems so disorganized, loud and dirty to many, will very likely bear revolutionary fruit, and I think that this seismic shift in the way we think about our society, is a wave that’s breaking right over the heads of those who dismiss it as aimless, bongo-playing dilettantism. As Fran Liebowitz said, “ In the Soviet Union, capitalism triumphed over communism. In this country capitalism triumphed over democracy.”

We need to think about that, and perhaps respond to it.

My cousins are students in Montreal and they’re brilliant and so well informed that they’ll make your head spin. And what they are doing in striking and taking to the streets is a purely democratic act. A lot of their money is invested by the government in a way that they don’t agree with and they’re asking the government to redirect that money toward something that they agree with—education.  I want to live in a country where post-secondary education is affordable to people. They think of that as a core value. What is wrong with that?

As Dave Eggers said, “The truth is not two-sided, it’s round.”

The mocking tone of certainty issuing forth from elders on this issue lacks grace, empathy and hope, and perhaps even worse, it lacks imagination. I think that we should see what happens, how the students proceed and what goals they might achieve, before jumping in and telling them that they’re wrong and that when we went to school we had to walk 15 miles in the snow.

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Heidi always have vivid dreams.

Last night Heidi fly.  Heidi so fast through air, like bullet through clouds, dogrocket explode into flock of seagulls!

Seagulls try to escape but can’t, Heidi gobble them like she Ms. Pacman, and then Heidi start to feel all heavy and full, get sleepy and start to fall to earth then wake up! What dream mean?!

Heidi have her own TV show. Variety type.

Heidi on greenwet grass, mud and moon. Moving fast and low, all sense on high alert. Heidi at top of her game, can smell mouse fear two miles away! Tail wag, tail wag! And then Heidi begin to dig hole, digdigdig! Not know why, just dig, something to find, Heidi just know it, and then Heidi dig into open, perfect den and there Heidi see father dog licking teeth of another male dog! Heidi no know what to do, so Heidi bark, wake up barking! Awful, just awful dream! Bad dream, bad!!

Heidi standing on back legs for treat. Heidi hate this. Like circus monkey. Like slave circus monkey! Very humiliating. Four-eyed, two-legged treat giver lean in to give Heidi monkey treat and then Heidi lunge and bite face off!!

Heidi making mince meat out of fetch. Every ball that thrown, Heidi snatch in mouth just like that! Heidi in zone! Like ball moving in slo-motion. Then Heidi have to lick herself! Can’t stop licking! Ball keeps getting thrown and bouncing by Heidi, but she can no longer get it because she always licking. Other dogs come, but not nice dogs. Evil dogs with fire eyes and breath like chicory. They just circle Heidi and watch, watch Heidi with fire eyes and Heidi can do nothing but lick.

In dream Heidi living in den with cats. Heidi speak perfect Cat, understand everything. Heidi have good time and dance with cats.

Everything great and then we start to talk about politics and cats very arrogant in view, don’t believe in government! Don’t understand concept of pack sharing. Cats won’t listen to Heidi, who making good points, just say animals like Heidi just need to work harder. This infuriate Heidi! Heidi rip heads off cats!! Blood everywhere!

Heidi invent new type of heating pad that becomes meat after you warm. Get warm and then eat meat! Heidi become very famous dog and have many lovers. Very sexy good dream.