Writing

I love words.  I’ve always loved words. 

As a child on a dairy farm near Wingham, three hours west of Toronto, I was often alone.  Television-less by choice (my parents’, not mine),  and with older siblings gone from home, I had little to do other than read.  I consumed books like I consumed milk - in large quantities and indiscriminately - for like milk, books were free and plentiful.  My parents’ collection was full of English classics, my sisters left their more modern fare for me, and the library was at my disposal.   I could talk just as easily about Pooh sticks or Avonlea as I could about Madame Defarge, Frodo Baggins, or the White Oaks of Jalna.  It all fed the same need in me to escape to other worlds.    

I won a summer reading contest at the library when I was 10, and was disappointed the prize was a kids’ book.  “Dick Wittington’s cat?” I said with disgust.  Hadn’t the librarians seen the stuff I was reading?  

In grade 8, my French teacher snatched a book from my desk, saying accusingly, “Do your parents know you’re reading this?”  With the self-righteousness of a 13 year old, I assured her they did.  She backtracked quickly, saying, “Can I read it when you’re done?”  It was Jacqueline Susann’s best-selling and very adult novel,“Valley of the Dolls.”  

About the same time, I published my first article in the local monthly magazine, “The Rural Voice.” It chronicled my experience living with the men and women dad hired to work on the farm.  I was excited to get it published, but regrettably, it didn’t kick off a great writing career.  

Through high school my appreciation for language grew when I was taught by the English teacher whose earlier student, Alice Munro, went on to win the Nobel prize for literature. Munro was in Mrs. Tiffin’s class in her first year of teaching; I was in her last.   Tiffin instilled in me a great love of quality writing, from novels, to essays, to Lennon & McCartney.  

Still, the urge to write for an audience remained dormant.   

As I went through undergraduate, graduate school, and my years working at the City of Toronto, I wrote as needed to pass or get paid.   I did however write letters to friends as a way to spin a good story and share the minutiae of my life in what I like to think was an amusing way. 

My first real foray into writing for others happened when in 2002 I left Toronto for law school on the west coast.  Suddenly I had many people to keep up with and the technology - email - to do it efficiently.  I started writing regular group updates. These ramped up in 2004 when I spent four months doing an internship in Brussels.  I was 38, living away from Canada for the first time, and wanted to share observations about my day to day life.   

I picked up the habit again when, after my return from law school, the love of my life was diagnosed with cancer. I had news to share and many people anxious to hear it.  I resumed the update emails and realized again the great joy and for the first time, the therapeutic value, of writing.  

It took a pandemic though to bring it all together.   It was August 8, 2020.  I had been in COVID 19 solitary confinement for 21 weeks.  Did I need to be that solitary? No.  Ontario pandemic restrictions had lifted between the first and second waves allowing gatherings, “bubbles”, and so on.  I knew the province was moving too far, too fast to relax restrictions in favour of the economy.  There was community spread.  People were still dying.  People were out and about but not me.  I was at home alone and needed a project.  

I had talked about writing a book about my experience with Jack since he died in November 2018.  I had written parts of this story for different purposes.  People had told me I have a style that is accessible and a story worth sharing.  

Writing a book is the mother of all projects so I made it my COVID 19 project.