The crowd outside the stadium in TO is wild! Can you hear the cheering?
I could not hear it, but I could hear the occasional whoop coming through the open window as people made their way up or down the street.
Sitting in the dark, listening, it felt like a blackout had washed the city free. Everyone was experiencing the same thing. Everyone was happily displaced, vibrant.
In the wake of the victory some of the broadcasters have been anointing the Raptors Canada’s team, but I’m not sure that’s the case. The Raptors are Toronto’s team, reflecting a sensibility in league, sport and composition that is unique to the city. The players in the NBA, much more partners than faceless subordinates, are a revolution unto themselves. And in Toronto where the culture wars seems to burn so much brighter and hotter that the ROC, the Raptors embodied not just the demographic of the city they worked in, but the aspirations of the people who lived there, too.
For awhile now, particularly amongst people younger than me, the Raptors have served as connective tissue, the casual language spoken at parties and bars. This is not your father’s corporate sports team. This is something else. It’s youth, it’s velocity, it’s progress. The Leafs and Jays were institutional legacies passed on from bygone eras, but the Raptors were not, they were the living present of the city.
And last night there was such joy and hope. People were experiencing things they would never experience again. Their lives were being written, histories formed. They were young and beautiful and united, and the world was changing not just before them, but from within them, and everything was cresting, limitless and glowing.
]]>In it, I am wearing a costume that is clearly racist and offensive.
This picture was taken from a Christmas Assembly at Lisgar Collegiate in Ottawa, Ontario, and I was performing a rap as an “urban Santa.” Although I was not in black face as some have asserted, my family and I had just returned from a vacation in Hawaii and I had a very uncharacteristic tan. I am deeply apologetic for that triggering tan, the privilege that implies, and for my blatant cultural appropriation.
It is also true that I wrote, “I HAVE ALWAYS HAD A CRAZY CRUSH ON YOU!! in Marie-Therese Vitzhum’s yearbook in 1983. I am deeply embarrassed by my insensitivity to my brothers and sisters who struggle with mental illness. After finishing in the bottom third of the standings in a fantasy hockey league two years ago, I, too, fell into a depression, so I need you to know you have an ally in Michael Murray, not an enemy.
I love you.
I hear you.
And I am listening.
These past behaviours of mine are not in keeping with who I am today or the values I have fought for throughout my career as Commissioner of the Dirty Pigeon Fantasy Hockey League. I want to offer my sincerest apology, and to state my absolute commitment to living up to the expectations the Dirty Pigeon Fantasy Hockey Community set for me when you elected me Commissioner. I understand why your faith in me has been shaken, and I recognize that it will take time and serious effort to heal the damage this conduct has caused.
I am ready to do that important work.
Humbled and grateful for this teachable moment.
Your fantasy hockey Commissioner,
Michael Murray
]]>As many of you likely remember, Rob Ford, the late Mayor of Toronto, and I were enrolled at Carleton University in Ottawa at the same time back in the 1980’s.
We became drinking buddies then, and I got to know his family a little bit and have found myself in the entirely surprising position as being in a Book Club with Doug Ford, his older, angrier, more politically conservative brother, who was just elected Premier of Ontario.
Here is a partial transcript of the meeting of our last Book Club:
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Doug Ford: Okay, okay, quieten down.
Lucy: Oh, I just watched the movie and it was SO scary.
Me: Was it the original or the remake?
Doug Ford: Jesus and goddamn, put a sock in it!
Me: Sorry.
Doug Ford: I’ll make you sorry Murray. You and I, shot put field after this. No excuses, and for Christ’s sake, use a coaster! This isn’t some chicken shack, here!
Lucy: I would love it if this was a chicken shack.
Doug Ford: Goddamn Lucy, you are on warning!
And if there is one more interruption from either of you, Sweet Jesus, you don’t even want to know. Just try me. ( Several seconds pass) Yeah, you just try me. Okay, that’s what I thought.
Okay then. The Amityville Horror by Jay Anson.
Story of a businessman who saw a really, really sweet real estate deal. He takes advantage and moves his family into this great house and it turns out it’s haunted and everybody gets scared and they run away from the best investment they ever made. But why the haunting, what does that symbolize?
Lucy: It’s the story of Colonialsm. The house was built on an ancient Indian burial ground, and some white settlers arrived and did not honour this, so the haunting is symbolic of the suffering and fury and pain of our first peoples whom we’ve commodified and marginalized.
Doug Ford: I think I’m going puke.
I’ve never heard something so stupid in my entire life.
The ghosts are big government regulations that drove the businessman crazy. He made a good investment. Was doing some renos. Providing jobs for his community. But every time he goes to do something, say make a panic room or dungeon chamber, there’s some inspector pecking, pecking, pecking at him. Everywhere he turns: regulations, taxation, bureaucracy, protests, special interests. Even when he’s trying to have relations with his lady, regulations show up in the form of some spirit!
It’s exhausting. And you think it’s the ghosts who are the victims?? You got a screw loose, Lucy, a goddamn screw loose. The businessman is the victim here, harassed by the state to the point of madness, it’s a miracle that he was strong enough not to go on a mass killing spree!
Me: So you’re saying this book is a cautionary tale against big government?
Doug Ford: Slow clap for Einstein here. Yes, dammit, of course the book is a cautionary tale against government interference, and it’s as plain as this expensive gold chain around my neck.
And if you can’t see that, well, there’s nothing that can be done, you might as well move to Russia, comrade.
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The Leafs are on TV, but they’re losing again and nobody much seems to care, instead, they focus on the consoles in front of them, concentrating on the trivia game unfolding on the monitors above the bar.
“Which film features a man living the same day over and over again?”
The guy to my right, who is still in his FedEx uniform, is startled to attentiveness by this question, “Groundhog Day, Groundhog Day!” he shouts as if sounding an alarm.
The other men, slowly and silently, reluctantly even, nod—tell them something they didn’t know.
To my left is a man who smells like cigarette smoke and is wearing the sort of sweater that invites fascination and curiosity. How old is that sweater? Was it a gift? If not, what was it that attracted him to it? He’s the most animated person in the bar, giggling nervously and speaking quickly, his eyes always darting. He and the bartender, an efficient but world-weary bald guy, have a rapport, a banter, and they’re trying to stump one another with arcane Simpson’s trivia and forgotten players from the OJ trial.
Mark Furhman!
Nicole Simpson’s dog was a white Akita!
Can I borrow a feeling by Kirk Van Houten!
All night the conversation jumps about in this way. They’re no longer the people that they became, but are now floating free, inhabiting a nostalgic landscape where they remain limitless and ascending. O, there are just so many details to untangle and isolate, to cherish… Episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation, what country was the best to build your base from when playing Risk, and later, the naming of all the Replicants from Blade Runner, each one uttered with tenderness and respect, as if each one a kind of miracle, like a love from the past who was never to be seen again.
I’m a pretty busy guy so I don’t have an awful lot of time for reading, but I tell you, I wish I did. I love that feeling when you’re reading a good book, like one by Stephen King, and you just can’t stop turning the pages! It’s like a friggin’ addiction or something and you just have to know who’s gonna be the next to get killed, you know? So exciting. Reading, it’s a real passion, if I had the time.
So on my bookcases you can see all sorts of stuff. This is a football. I got it a Bill’s game. It’s signed by Jim Kelly, the best goddamn passer of his era. I tell you, he wasn’t afraid of taking a hit in order to make the pass. Class act, Jim Kelly, class act.
Over here we have my bobble-head doll. I look a little slimmer in it than real life, I guess, ha-ha! And this is a Toronto Argonaut football helmet radio. Had it since I was a kid.
This is the Bible, written by God, obviously. I take a lot of inspiration from it. Means a lot to me. Really, really would have liked to have to sat down and had a pint or two with Jesus. He was a real man of the people. This one is Chicken Soup for the Soul. It’s also inspirational, like a bible for people that haven’t yet had their Jesus moment. This is a book about the cars from the Fast and the Furious movies. It’s pretty cool. By the way, I just want to say that it was really sad that the guy from those movies died, but at least it was a warrior’s death, so respect to him and his family.
Let’s see, I got some more stuff over here: some fantasy football magazines, Infinite Jest—never got through it—a Florida travel guide and Beloved by Toni Morrison. I wept like a baby when I read that book. Loved the line about being “full of a baby’s venom.” I tell you, if I were the type to get a tattoo, that’s the tattoo I would get. Toni Morrison rocks. Moving on, I got a puck here signed by the Toronto Maple Leafs, and oh, this is the Velveteen Rabbit. I’ve had it since I was a kid, it’s about a doll you can’t kill.
]]>“In 1986 I lived in Montreal for my first year at university, and I listened to every single Canadiens games on the radio. They weren’t really a great team, but they won the cup that year, largely because of Patrick Roy, who was unbeatable. But my favourite player was Chris Nilan, the goon on the team. Nobody wanted to win more and he would do anything, absolutely anything for the team. And when he was on the ice you knew it was going to be okay. Even if you lost, you still knew it was going to be okay, that somehow you still won. It reassuring, a defiantly optimistic kind of feeling and it gave me confidence, something I probably really needed being away from home for the first time.“
“My wife recently got into hockey and one night a week she would play shinny with a bunch of other women at an outdoor rink. Sometimes I took the dog out to play fetch and watch. I remember how beautiful and quiet it was out there. The acoustics in the winter are so soft and different, almost as if isolated and then put in slow motion. There was nothing but the sound of the game—the blades on the ice, the sticks on the puck and the players breathing, shouting to one another… The spirit of the games were so gentle and cooperative, too, everybody actually on the same side, sharing with one another something they loved. And I would be there off in the distance, the dog running after the ball, so happy to be bounding through the snow, and it all just felt so pure and lovely. Those moments were poems.”
“I don’t have any association with it. I never played as a kid because we were too poor, and now, after the car accident, I’m never going to have the chance. I live on the street now. My body’s been ruined, look at this, I’m in constant pain and I can’t work. My shoulder dislocates when I’m sleeping and I wake up screaming. I don’t know if I’m crazy or not, you know? And whadda ya the doctors give me for the pain? Methadone. And you know what it does for me? It makes my dick soft, so no, I don’t think nothing when you say hockey.”
“When I was ten my father would do up my skates before each game. He laced them tighter than I ever could, and it felt like getting tucked into bed, only a kind of opposite. And then after the game he would buy me an Orange Fanta and to this day whenever I have one I am instantly transported back in time, to the smell of that rink and the permanence of my father’s understated love.”
Similarly, Rudolph Giuliana, led New York, America and pretty much the rest of the world, in the midst of the September 11th attacks on New York City. Ever-present, he was tireless, an informed, robust, sincere and deeply invested presence that was able to offer us, if not absolute comfort, at least a sense of stability and continuance. Great mayors rise to great challenges.
On May 13th of 2013, the much loved and beleaguered Toronto Maple Leafs were eliminated by the Boston Bruins in game 7 of the first round of the Stanley Cup finals. Normally, this would be considered a victory for the chronically underachieving Leafs, but in this case they suffered a historic collapse, relinquishing a 4-1 lead with less than 15 minutes left to play. The city of Toronto was utterly devastated. It was at this time that Rob Ford stepped up to the plate and revealed that he was a great leader.
The Press Conference:
Q: How are you feeling mayor?
A: Frig. I’m not sure I have the words. It’s just, you know, not right. You’re at home eating your hot dogs expecting victory, and then this. It’s just, just, geez, you know?
Q: Are you proud of the team for the way the team battled against the heavily favoured Bruins?
A: It’s just an emotional time for me. I can’t speak right now. You know, there are Bros crying in Maple Leaf Square tonight. They’re painted blue. Some of them have shaved their chest so that they look like maple leafs. It’s just tragic.
Q: Do you have any words of support for Torontonians right now?
A: Reimer was real weak on that last goal. Boy. It’s hard to believe he has a hot wife. Little skinny, but still. Also, the referees were crappy. We’re going to look into protesting the outcome, maybe hold it up in court.
Q: What do you think of Toronto’s chances next year?
A: Are you serious!? What do you expect me to say!!?? This is a tragedy! Now’s not the time for such questions, holy hell! You guys in the media never cease to amaze me! You have no class! Zero! Bunch of crappy referees is what you are, why don’t you try getting a real job, eh? I’m done with this, I’m going to get something to eat—outta my way!
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After this, as a means of contrast, Rachelle and I watched Commander Hadfield’s return to Earth. For those of you who are not Canadian, Commander Chris Hadfield is a Canadian Astronaut who has spent the last 5 months on the International Space Station. It was here, through his use of Twitter– where he accumulated nearly one million followers—that he became something of a folk hero.
Avuncular, proportional and competent, Hadfield seems like a really, really nice guy. A Canadian guy. His moustache is friendly, like the sexually non-threatening moustache of a well-liked high school teacher, and his manner is sincere, thoughtful and fun, but still, you know this guy is operating at a very high level. You want him as your next-door neighbour. He would know what to do when the power went out and you thought you heard something funny in the basement.
Attached to a parachute, the Soyuz space capsule drifted down from space into a field in Kazakhstan like a child’s toy. A bunch of unofficial looking Russians then went over, as if farmers inspecting something that had fallen from the past rather than the future, and pulled the astronauts from the capsule. This was done without the least trace of urgency, like something they were practicing for in their street clothes rather than the main event.
The first out was the Russian and he looked hale, hearty and ready to start tossing a Kettlebell around. The next to follow, the American and Hadfield, looked small, pale and a little worse for the wear, like space travel extracted a physical toll.
They were all put on what looked like unmatched lawn chairs and gave the cameras the thumbs-up. Our CBC commentators were giddy, gushing about how robust and great Hadfield looked. It was surreal, like watching some weird variation of a Soviet propaganda film.
Regardless, what Hadfield did on his mission was utterly wonderful. From his photographs, videos and tweets, he shared with the public a suggestion of what might be considered the divine. The world is stunning in its beauty, and by extension we, all just brief, tiny organic outcroppings of the same living entity, are beautiful, too.
There are many who think that the International Space Station is a huge waste of money, one that doesn’t provide sufficient scientific benefit, but Hadfield, (his Space Oddity video was the most watched on YouTube Monday) showed us that data is perhaps secondary to the opportunity to see ourselves through eyes never imagined.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Wow.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Fucking wow.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Don’t think that guy will be finishing the race. What a shame. : (
@TOPDOGMAYOR: It breaks your heart when an athlete is injured like that.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Toronto salutes Boston, city of Bravery, Brawn, Brains and Beans and Lettuce.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: We are all Boston Beans today.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Fucking hate terrorists.
@TOPDOGMAOR: White or brown terrorists? Send in your votes!!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Should decide this once and for all on the football grid, like men!!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Who is your favourite football player? Free parking spot to person who submits best answer.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Authorities saying bomb was made from Crock Pot full of nails and BBs.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Like my Crock Pots to be full of chili. LOL.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Can’t believe they canceled Bruins-Pens game. Must be very serious situation.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Toronto, you are safe, I am at the helm.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Probably won’t go to Florida this week, but if I do, contact: councillor_dford@toronto.ca in case of emerg.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: So many heroes. Like that guy in the cowboy hat.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Free lifetime parking spot in Toronto for guy in cowboy hat!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: He is a cowboy, on a steel horse he rides! Guns N’ Roses, man, Guns N’ Roses.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Suspects in bombing ID’d!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Wouldn’t want to be wearing white ball cap in Beantown today!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Hope Ben Afflect makes movie about this. Argo ruled!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Now donning Red Sox baseball cap in honour of victims. Suggest you do the same.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Send poison in the mail to this Mayor, expect a world of trouble.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Elvis impersonator terrorists, I am watching you.
@TOPDODMAYOR: Some cop killed in wild shootout at Harvard!!!
@ TOPDOGMAYOR: Evil doers carjack classy Mercedes and knock-off 7-11!!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: It’s like a Tarrantino flick. Completely fucking awesome.
@TOPDOFMAYOR: Heart goes out to family of fallen hero.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Hope guy with cowboy hat gets involved and kicks ass!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Really like to see Uma Thurman character involved, too.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Not a movie, but feels like movie.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: HUGE FUCKING SHOOT-OUT IN BEAN TOWN!!!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: One Borat guy now dead, looking for other!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: All of Boston shut down! Fucking love Boston!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Love to be mayor of Boston. Got big, brass balls!!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Dead guy was athlete. Shame when athlete dies young, even if terrorist athlete.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: @Dougford Can’t delete last Tweet. WTF???
@TOPDOGMAYOR: MAYOR FORD DOES NOT CONDONE TERRORISM IN ANY FORM, EVEN BY ATHLETES.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Other Borat now hiding in boat. On land. What a moron!!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Interesting. Boston seems to be doing fine without mass transit. Must be saving a shitload.
@TOPDOGMAYOR: No vowels in the Borat names. Weird. How do you say them??
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Little Borat captured!!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Great day for Boston, great day for freedom!!!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: Bet they riot in streets in celebration! Love to be there!! Go Boston!!!
@TOPDOGMAYOR: USA!!USA!!!USA!!!
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This is a recent email that I sent to him:
Slobber!
How’s it hanging, Mister Touchdown?
Things are pretty great in our world, one reason being that Rachelle just introduced me to a new App on my iPhone called Draw Free. It’s way cool, like Pictionary for your phone. You play with a friend, and each one of you gets a word you have to draw out using your finger on the screen of your phone, and the other one has to guess what it is. Here’s my drawing of Bruce Lee, pretty awesome, eh?
We should play sometime. It would be an awesome drinking game and I’d fucking love to play a kind of adult version (NO HOMO) with you!
Anyway, the real reason I’m writing is that an acquaintance of mine was in a library the other day and he wrote this about the experience:
“Hoards of youth in the library today. Dozens & dozens. We’ve got to do something about young people in the library. Will lead to trouble.”
Just thought the Mayor should know.
Keep well, Slobber, keep well!
Michael Murray
Mur:
I am completely fucking in with the Draw Stuff game.
Art was one of my favourite classes back in school, and my teachers thought I had talent. I used to paint kick ass Star Wars scenes. I did one watercolour of Luke and Princess Leia that was so out of the box they made me see the school psychologist. Miss Hancock. Jesus, she was hot. Boner City, man, Boner City.
I’m glad you brought this library shit to my attention. The last thing we need are libraries jammed full of teens. That would be a shit show. I’m tough on crime, and I’m not going to help create an environment that would make things easier for crazy shooters. Libraries should only have a couple of nerds in them at a time, while the rest of our kids are at football practice, learning how to drive or at home on the Net. We need to shut down the library gravy train.
I’m going to launch a campaign called Library No More. It’s going to be fucking awesome. We’re going to have pro athletes on board and look into the idea of mobile libraries, kind of like the ice cream truck, only with books. We can shut down libraries all over the city, and then service those areas with the library truck once a week.
Dude, can you come down to City Hall so we can talk more about this? And let’s play that Draw thing! Why don’t they have that in bars, anyway, like Karaoke for drawers? Drawaoke, they could call it. Fuck, my brain is on fire with ideas! It’s a Rob Roll!! A Ford Fire!! Gotta cancel all my meetings and stoke the flames!!
Slobber
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