He has a piece of gauze over his left eye and sits there wordlessly, his face giving nothing away. His mother looks so warm and concerned, so ready to help. She keeps looking over at him, searching for ways to make him feel better, but he offers no clues as to what she might be able to do. There is such yearning in her eyes–she wants to climb into him and fill him with strength, she wants to absorb all of his pain, she wants to take him to that lake he loved as a child and watch him return to being her limitless and beautiful boy.

Everybody in the waiting room appears weary and drained of confidence on this day. A man of about 60, somebody who looked like he had lived well and confidently in his body for decades, groans when he shifts his weight and tries to cross his legs. As if avoiding one another, even ourselves, all eyes drift to the TV set where a news station, crammed with all manner of banners and crawls, is on. So much news, so many things of the world competing for our attention. And along the bottom of the screen, as random as a dream fragment, “ Prince Harry regrets not talking more to Prince William about his mother’s death.” And suddenly I’m traveling in time and back on Elgin Street in Ottawa 20 years ago. There were perhaps ten of us, huddled together on the sidewalk watching a TV through a window, all staring at a shot of a crumpled, black car in the middle of a tunnel.

Some people were crying, and I remember thinking that was a display of sentiment, and that we couldn’t possibly feel sincere emotion for celebrities who had been so one-dimensionally assembled for our consumption.

And I was wrong in the ways that only a young, single man could be, I was so very, very wrong.

Heidi big star.

Known all over world.

Not just because Heidi so cute she make your teeth hurt, or because Heidi so fast you think, “BLACK AND TAN LIGHTING JUST FLASH FROM SKY!!,” also because Heidi such a great writer it make you want to give up and cry. Maybe try hard drug and then later when feel empty after rehab, start to cut yourself just to see if still feel.

Heidi can be very damaging for self-esteem of others.

Heidi not bragging, just telling it like it is.

So Heidi get huge amount of fan mail. So many requests. So many dirty pitchers of dog penises! It all crazy!

Recently Heidi receive request from the Ilford Animal Cemetery in England.

Animals who fought and died for pathetic two-leggers, buried there. Coward two-leggers disgust Heidi! Enslave animals to fight for them! Make Heidi sick. Many stories of brave animals who die for stupid two-leggers lost, and now two-leggers want Heidi to write about hero animals who received medal for bravery.

Even though Heidi hate two-leggers Heidi say yes because of money. 

You don’t want to know how much Heidi get paid for this gig.

So much money and treat you wouldn’t believe. 

Beauty, Rescue Dog No. 3477/9277:

Beauty was a Bedlington Terrier, so name not true. Wire-haired Terrier dog ugly.

Very ugly. So ugly make Heidi barf, and not the sort of barf you want lick up. So Beauty probably shunned by other dogs. Possible Beauty depressed, had no choice but to work suicide job for coward two-leggers. Beauty rescued 63 animal from rubble, including some cats, so know Beauty not right in head, but still, in end, Beauty good dog, in spite of bad looks!

Peter, Rescue Dog No. 2664/9288:

Peter a beautiful Border Collie. Very hot. Heidi would have liked to have met Peter in bushes on dangerous escape. Would have made passionate, urgent love! Maybe in different life Peter be Baby Daddy for Heidi. Peter titan amongst dog, might have saved up to one million lives. Peter not very, very good dog, Peter very, very great dog! Peter hate Hitler.

Tyke, Carrier Pigeon 1263 MEPS 43

Two-legger steel death birds that drop fire always carry real bird with them.

When two-legger fake bird crash, real bird flies off with message that say where flightless, useless crew is. This make bird hero? All bird do is fly. It what bird do. If Heidi dig hole, does Heidi get medal? NO! Heidi told, BAD DOG, and then get sprayed with hose!! For sure something bad happen to Heidi. No make sense. Anyway, if Heidi carry message to Tyke it would say, “Guess can’t expect much from bird, but Tyke, you gave world as much as you could, so rest in peace, little brother!”

Donald J. Trump: I just hope that Brad was smart and had a prenup like I did. #ArtofTheDeal

Donald J. Trump: Getting married, like ISIS, is no joke– you need to be ruthless when you end it!

Donald J. Trump: It’s a nuclear situation. #VladisaGreatLeader

Donald J. Trump: Brad Pitt, a little flaky. In a golf tournament with him once. No sense for the game.

Donald J. Trump: Quite a bit shorter than me, but still a real looker.

Donald J. Trump: Anyway, when you’re rich and powerful you can have your pick. That’s the American way.

Donald J. Trump: Brad knows that, so why would he stay with damaged goods?

Donald J. Trump: Why would America stay with damaged goods? Time for a change, America! #TrumpIceGreatestWaterEver

Donald J. Trump: Sure, Angelina was really something a few year ago, but now? After all those cancer surgeries? Brad can do better. America can do better! #VoteTrump

Donald J. Trump: Do people notice Crooked and Sick Hillary is copying my airplane rallies – she puts the plane behind her like I have been doing from the beginning.

Donald J. Trump: Crooked and Sick Hillary is taking the day off again, she needs the rest. Sleep well Crooked and Sick Hillary – see you at the debate!

Donald J. Trump: Wonder if Gwyneth Paltrow had anything to do with the end of Brangelina?

Donald J. Trump: Wouldn’t put it past her.

Donald J. Trump: You gotta watch out for the exes. Always come crawling back.

Donald J. Trump: Paltrow married a Brit. Always putting on a fake accent. Don’t trust her.

Donald J. Trump: Both she and Angelina are washed up. Sad.

Donald J. Trump: Bet Jennifer Aniston is happy now.

Donald J. Trump: There’s an American. A real girl next door.

Donald J. Trump: Rachel, and those headlights? Whoah. What American man didn’t want to shtup her?

Donald J. Trump: I would take my chances with her, she’s one Skittle I’d eat regardless of the poison risk. #NoToSyrianRefugees

Donald J. Trump: Did I have sex with Jennifer Aniston? Gentlemen don’t tell. #Probably

Donald J. Trump: Did I have sex with Jennifer Aniston, Gwyneth Paltrow and Angelina Jolie? All I will say is I am very happy with my beautiful wife.

Donald J. Trump: Melania will be the most beautiful First Lady in history!

Donald J. Trump: I know it’s not politically correct to say, but Crooked Hillary has to be the ugliest FLOTUS in history!

Donald J. Trump: Why would we want her as the ugliest POTUS, too?

Donald J. Trump: Brad Pitt hates Crooked Hillary.

Donald J. Trump: I don’t even think Bill had sex with Crooked, Sick Hillary. #WasChelseaAdopted

Donald J. Trump: Crooked Hillary wants to take your 2nd Amendment rights away. Will guns be taken from her heavily armed Secret Service detail? Maybe not!

Donald J. Trump: However, you do have to hand it to Angelina for taking her clothes off in so many movies. Very brave.

Donald J. Trump: Nobody braver than our troops though! Not even naked Angelina!

Donald J. Trump: She never would have had a done a nude scene if she was a Muslim. #FeministsForTrump

Donald J. Trump: Think about it America.

Donald J. Trump: Commemorative Donald Trump coins now available for order. #Buy9The10thForFree

It wasn’t the first time I’ve seen a video of this kind, and each time that I do have the same visceral, almost emotional response. Instinctively, like my primal core has suddenly been activated, I know that something’s wrong. I know it in my bones.

The stripped and ruined landscape, stretching endlessly around you, is awesome in the worst sense of the word. It’s a sincere horror, and looking down at it you feel like you’re viewing a crime scene where acts of unspeakable cruelty and evil have taken place. It’s like that lofty view, which grants such scope and perspective, completely alters one’s view, orienting it toward the eternal. I know that I’m coming in at a pretty high pitch here, but it’s truly how it makes me feel.

The oil being extracted from the tar sands, as I’m sure you know, is very costly to process, with the emissions created from developing it being 12% greater than conventional oil. It couldn’t be dirtier, and each barrel of oil requires three barrels of water to produce it. The question of whether oil is more valuable than water is a fundamentally ridiculous one, and that this question was even open to rational inquiry will be seen as a tragedy in 50 years.

The Athabasca Tar Sands are utterly massive. Covering about 140,000 square kilometres of boreal forest, it’s larger than countries like England, Greece and North Korea. The land will be obliterated, as if from a nuclear apocalypse, and the equipment and structures that are used to mine the oil are so large that they command their own weather systems. It’s a dystopian vision, as if a predatory alien culture had descended upon the planet and began to ruthlessly drain it of all resources while maintaining absolute indifference to whether the host organism lived or died. (There are two smaller Tar Sands, Peace River and Cold Lake, each about a fifth of the size of Athabasca.)

The Prime Minister of this country has said that he won’t do anything to address climate change that would cost Canadians any jobs. The Tar Sands, ruinous and retrograde in so many ways, is a job creator, and so in the face of all other reason it goes forward. However, one glance at the razed, apocalyptic world it inhabits, this kind of Mordor, and even a child can cut through all the rhetoric, economics and complex global politics to see that what’s taking place is plainly wrong.

Dear Queen Elizabeth II:

Happy birthday!!!

I just want to say that you look absolutely fantastic for 88! Really, I could see in the photograph that your skin was just glowing so I really want to congratulate you on that. I had my passport photograph taken yesterday, after only a five year interval, and I’m very sorry to say that I looked asymmetrical, angry and jaundiced, like a hard drinking 68 year-old. Really, I looked like I live in Russia or something, and I don’t!

I’m actually from Canada, so I’m one of your subjects, and when I was a boy I used to collect stamps with you on them. There must have been hundreds of them, and they all looked pretty much alike—you, looking regal in front of some aspect of Canadian industry.

None of them were valuable for collectors as so many were printed and used to mail letters. (You remember mailing letters, don’t you? Or maybe you don’t. Maybe you always had a fancy butler to mail them for you and put the stamp on the envelope, otherwise I guess it would have been pretty weird to put a stamp of yourself on the envelope. That’s the sort of thing that could go to a person’s head, I think.) At any rate, they were everyday stamps, the sort that filled the pages between the cool ones of Grizzly Bears or hockey players, but every once in awhile for a special occasion they’d put out a stamp of you that was practically the size of a hockey card. It would be either silver or gold and it was like finding a jewel. Suddenly, we got to see you in all your majesty, if that makes any sense.

Everybody has regrets, but I imagine a queen might have more than most. You were locked into a very particular life from the time you were born and you must always wonder about that boy you thought cute way back when, or what it would have been like to have been a hippy and get high with a Beatle. What would you say your biggest regret is?

I regret never learning how to fire a gun.

And if you could sleep with either Colin Firth or Russell Brand, which one would you choose?

Don’t be shy, it’s your birthday.

Michael Murray

PS: Is Gwyneth Paltrow really British?

She was the daughter of a British diplomat and she lived in a huge, failing stone mansion. I cannot tell you how much that impressed me. She had an accent so delicate that each word she spoke seemed to unfurl from her mouth like a flower, like a fragrance. Oh, how I was crazy for her, how I ached for her lips, but she preferred the bad boys. She liked them wicked and unpredictable. Boys who were born under punches, boys that didn’t ask questions and liked to fuck. I played tennis and coached T-ball.

I remember having my arm around her once when we were returning from a cottage. She was asleep, her head resting on my shoulder. It was autumn and the lake we were driving by was so beautiful, the leaves an astonishment reflecting off the water, like a choral reef turned into light.

And Louis Armstrong, the forever of Louis Armstrong, was playing in the car, as if narrating, and I had my arm around Rebecca Harris who was so wonderfully asleep and safe and nestled into me, and it was a perfect moment that I wanted to sustain for eternity. Yes. This was it. Yes. And then the car hit a bump and I bounced up and hit my head on the roof and Rebecca woke up, startled. For the rest of the drive home I kept my arm around her, but it was different now, all wrong. It was like my arm was pinned behind her back and neither one of us was comfortable, and the Louis Armstrong that was playing became the crappy, sanitized Louis Armstrong and the lake fell behind us as we entered into the junk land that ringed the city, passing hamburger joints and lonely, broken homes, places and things that weren’t quite where they wanted to be.