From InsideToronto.com: Celebrity Musing - Morgan Freeman Hoax Yields Goodness

My December Celebrity Musing column for InsideToronto.com looks at the potential of goodness to emerge from a celebrity hoax.  You can link to the Inside Toronto column here or digest the text below.  Hope you enjoy yourself, and thanks for popping by to read it. 

If you place social media in a position of unquestioned integrity, Morgan Freeman has been a very busy man of late - or perhaps not.  According to that same media, just a few months after his death, he authored a Facebook essay that condemned mainstream media for inadvertently glorifying the exploits of mass murderers, citing the recent horror of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings as a prime example.  

The essay, a poignant plea for the mass media to focus on the names, faces and back stories of the victims rather than those of the gunman, struck a chord with social media subscribers and went viral within hours of first appearing online.
Academy Award winner, activist, humanitarian and one of the most distinguished voices of our generation, Morgan Freeman is in fact alive and well and at the risk of disappointing those who have shared the “Turn Off The News” essay attributed to him, that, too, was a hoax. 

Consistent with what good-hearted and grieving citizens would have him stand up and champion, it nonetheless appears he did not author this essay.

While Freeman was quick to dispel and subsequently poke fun at the rumours of his passing, no statement has yet emerged from him or his handlers on the subject of the facebook posting that has been credited to him. Yet his lack of confirmation or denial of the penning of this missive is somehow fitting.  

Why is that?

Freeman was born into modest means in 1937; his father a barber, his mother a teacher. Like many children of that era, he bounced around as his parents frequently relocated to seek work. At the age of 12 he got himself into a spot of trouble with his elementary school teacher and as a form of discipline was made to try out for the school’s drama contest – which he won.  

Despite showing a natural talent for acting, he dreamed of being a fighter pilot. He joined the United States Air Force upon graduating from high school, but soon became disillusioned with the barriers that were thrown in his path, to say nothing of the epiphany he had in realizing he wanted to “help people up, not shoot them down.” 

Eventually relegated to a post as a radar technician, he retired from active duty and headed to Los Angeles in the early ’60s to pursue a career as an actor.

The road to success was a long one. He studied acting and dancing while working odd jobs to pay bills. Roles in children’s television and soap operas followed, but the widespread acclaim he sought came only after his Oscar-nominated role in Driving Miss Daisy - some 20 years after he moved to L.A.

With his personal life largely out of the limelight, he converted his stardom into an opportunity to give back. One of the founders of PLANIT NOW, an initiative that seeks to provide preparedness resources to areas commonly stricken by hurricanes, he lends his voice to organizations such as One Earth, which works to raise awareness of environmental issues. 
Mississippi remains home for the icon, and the now privately licensed pilot owns and operates a restaurant and a blues bar in Clarksdale.

While we labored under the misapprehension that a celebrity gave us insight at a time when we needed it, we must give full credit to the author because it actually does sound like something that Freeman would take a stand on.  

The sentiment behind the missive is both provocative and evocative, causing hundreds of thousands of people to give credence to the argument that we not reward violence with celebrity.  It made people think rather than simply react in the immediate aftermath of an overwhelming tragedy. Although not inked by a celebrity activist and humanitarian, one can’t help but wonder if this essay would have ripped through social media as it did without the celebrity tag.  

The phenomena that surrounds this story is a rare occurrence, one whereby the celebrity circus and the mammoth power of social media collide head on but actually form a cohesive bond, one that benefits humanity, and for that, I have nothing but praise.

Lest We Forget

Whites Road, Highway Of Heroes.

No matter how you to look at it, people who make a living in uniform spend their careers preparing for events that we all hope will never happen. But bad things happen, and when it comes to the Military, I wonder if at various times in history we might have confused our feelings for the horrors of war with our feelings for the courageous Canadians who answered the call to arms. But I'm relieved to be part of a generation that has begun to reverse the trend of withholding pride.  I wish I'd never had to stand on the Whites Road overpass to pay my respects to fallen soldiers from Afghanistan, but I never want to forget the Canadians I met on those days; it turns out we are a fiercely proud lot, deeply moved by the plight of ordinary families in their darkest hour.

I was raised a Military Dependent, so respect for those who serve their country is something I learned firsthand.  My father chose his career path at an extremely young age, having to get written permission from both of his parents and his high school principal to join the Navy at just 17 years of age.  I remember as a preschooler - and a university graduate - seeing my Mom press my father's uniform shirts with such incredible care and detail that no dry cleaner anywhere could match her work.  I remember my father spit shining his shoes at night and taking the the adhesive lint picker to his perfectly creased uniform trousers after he got up from the breakfast table.  When he left the house every morning to go to work, he was impeccably put together to the letter of the dress regulations - without exception.  I thought this was the way the entire world worked back then.  When at the age of 11 we moved into a home that was not on a Canadian Forces Base, I was utterly confused to discover that other people's households did not include somebody in uniform.

Dad  receives a service commendation on the Bonnie, 1966.

If my Father's family is Canadian Armed Forces, my Mother's side is United States Army and Marine Corps. Mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins, in-laws:  the uniform is everywhere in my family tree... and I couldn't be more proud.

So this morning I will attend Remembrance Day ceremonies and then make my way to my local Legion.  It's tradition, but perhaps also selfish.  I get to say thanks, which makes me feel good, and I get to hear veterans tell stories that rip my heart out or make me collapse in fits of laughter... or both.  There is an art to story telling, and I have yet to meet a veteran who hasn't mastered it.  Although on occasion rooted in the horrors of war, there is nonetheless always a light, a lesson, something to take away and use to make our own lives that much more meaningful.  I wouldn't miss it.

Today, please say thank you to anyone who has worn a uniform, be they military, police, fire, EMS, or any other branch of service.  Your gratitude will be warmly received, I assure you.

Three Hundred Forty-Three

     I’ve been thinking a lot about New York City lately, as has most of the connected world.  Why its residents are routinely made to show us what they’re made of escapes me but serves to restore my faith in humanity, and for that I offer a debt of gratitude.  Without faith (in something) we’d all be lost.  Faith in humanity is at times is a risky lot to invest in.  There are so many opportunities to lose faith in mankind, so to side step the crap is a lot of work some days.  But it’s the most honest work I do; having faith puts my heart and my head in perfect balance, allowing me to feel somewhat victorious against the odds... smug, almost.  But just 24 hours after Sandy kicked NYC and the Jersey Shore square in the teeth, and with the plight of its citizens firmly on my mind, I was reminded firsthand what it means to be touched personally by something that seems so much bigger than all of us.

     “What does this represent?” I asked, running my fingers over each of the numbers.

     “Three hundred forty-three… the number of firefighters lost in the World Trade Center on Nine Eleven.”

     I instantly took my hand off the graphic, feeling as though it was sacred and not to be disturbed.  The mood, for a few moments, shifted from carefree to reflective. Two things raced through my mind in a blur.

     The first was the memory of my fiercely proud American Mom and me standing at Ground Zero just a few months after the towers came down.  Mom and I are cut from the same cloth, and after spending hours reading heartbreaking hand written tributes to the fallen, we walked out onto the temporary viewing platform in stunned silence, tears running down our faces.  My Mom stood looking out at the site, which was still being excavated, and I remember walking up behind her, wrapping my arms tightly around her shoulders as though I might somehow lose her, nestling my chin against the back of her head and just staring at what was before us… desperately and silently willing the lives lost to somehow be returned to their rightful places.  It was devastating and so hopeless that it left an ache in me the intensity of which I’ll never forget.

     I carefully placed my hand back on the numbers, tracing them.  Three hundred and forty-three.  “I have a story to tell you about this sometime,” I said.  From within the second flash emerges that story.

     Just six weeks after 911, I was in Boston racing with the Argonaut Rowing Club crew in the women’s club eight event at the Head of The Charles Regatta.  Although we were long in the tooth for that race category (our average age was forty years, among crews full of collegiate-aged women), we arrived well prepared with great hull speed.  Seeded third among a huge field of crews, we knew we had a good starting position and were optimistic that we could convert that into a really good race. And race well we did, powering up the three mile section of the Charles River that makes up the race course with confidence, skill, and speed.  While we knew winning would be very unlikely given the quality of the field, we were hopeful for a top three finish and the medal that would accompany it.  So we were shocked to discover that we had in fact placed 16^th.  A closer examination of the results softened the blow when we saw that in what was one of the tightest races ever seen in that category, good numbers of boats crossed the line within a virtual heartbeat of one another… but we were not at the head of that very tight pack.  In rowing circles, finishing a mere 2.5% off the winning time in such a talented field would be considered a fantastic result.  But we expected more and left the race course pleased that we'd done everything we could but disappointed to place so far down the standings.

The 2001 HOCR Argonaut Rowing Club Women's Club 8+ Crew

     We went out for supper in Boston’s Back Bay that night and as things progressed and the wine flowed freely, we began to switch gears from disappointment to a real appreciation for how lucky we all were to be in the soup together; great friends and fabulous teammates, all nicely wrapped up in laughs, hugs, and a weekend in the never-anything-but awesome city of Boston.  Later that night we searched at length for a dance club that would take our group of nearly 20 life-loving, giggly rowers, as by this time we’d hooked up with our club’s men’s crew, who also felt they came up short on the race course that day.  After an hour of traipsing around the city, we gave up and poured ourselves into a small Irish pub on a back street just off Boston Common.  We took up residence at a few stools at and around the bar, and the manager cleared a couple of tables so that we had a place to dance, because frankly there was going to be dancing whether they supported it or not, and the staff recognized that creating a dance floor was better than having us dance wherever and whenever the mood struck. By then we were putting a bit of beer into our collective soul, and were dancing shamelessly to whatever came out of the jukebox.  It was so fun and so funny; we were enjoying a sense of freedom and gratitude at being able to suck up the sheer pleasures of life without a worry in the world.

     At some point in the midst of our revelry, I noticed a lone patron seated at the bar, playing with the glass in his hands and watching us with a look that I couldn't quite register   He appeared to be half amused and half tormented, so deferring to the possibility that he might be tormented, I smiled at him and shrugged my shoulders as I glanced at my posse, who by this time was dancing haphazardly to “Blister In The Sun”.  He cracked, like an egg rapped on the edge of an iron skillet... it was all over.  He smiled back and began to laugh.  I asked him if he wanted to move down a few stools and join us.  It was at that moment I saw on the bar beside him his uniform peak hat, with his gloves folded impeccably and resting on top of it.  I looked closer at him and was embarrassed that up until that moment I had failed to realize he was in full dress uniform with his tunic still buttoned, and his tie still tightened. As he distractedly played with the glass he cradled in his hands, I saw from his insignia that he was a firefighter with the Boston Fire Department.

     “Have you just arrived from somewhere?” I asked, fearful of his reply.

     “I've been here for a few hours,” he replied.   “I was in New York for a funeral today.”

     “Nine Eleven?” I queried, knowing that’s where he was but feeling that presumption would be somehow disrespectful.

     “Yes, he paused. “Not my first... and not my last,” he offered without looking up.

     I put my hand on his shoulder, which in hindsight was so incredibly forward that I’m blushing just thinking about it. But nonetheless, he looked up and I asked if he’d allow me and my friends to buy him a drink.  He quickly accepted and leaving his hat, gloves, and scotch on the bar, joined our group standing a few feet away.  He protested with great fanfare when I asked the bartender to put his drink on our tab, and further, he insisted on putting the pints I ordered for my pals on his tab.  A lengthy, animated discussion ensued about who was buying drinks for whom but in the end I won out and his drink went on our tab.

     For the next few hours we carried on just as the first, but now with all of us completely unaware of which drinks were going onto which tab.  From time to time I’d lean over the bar and ask the bartender if all the drinks were going on our tab and he just winked at me. So I winked back believing that the non-verbal conversation went exactly as I was hearing it in my head.  As for the rowers and newly minted hangers-on, we took turns chatting and laughing in small groups on bar stools or dancing on our now very popular dance floor.  It would appear that our spirit had ignited that of the other patrons, and several people were dancing.  Our uniformed friend had by now removed his tunic, and I noticed that his hat was perched atop the head of my friend Sue, whose long blond hair was flying all over the place as he whipped her around on the dance floor.  I smiled smugly, but on the outside.

     A few minutes later my friend Judy, who by now was wearing our friend’s tie, grabbed my arm and dragged me to the dance floor.  This?  This was not the essence of life, but rather the stuff that makes it so simplistically gratifying. I recall looking around the room at my friends in various stages of outright happiness thinking that we’d stumbled upon utopia…even if only for a few hours. I watched our adopted firefighter laughing as he spun Sue around the dance floor, and taking in everything that was happening around it knew that I’d just been schooled in the art of opening oneself up to being happy in the face of the gravest adversity. I was humbled.  I mean, admittedly I was also high on life, but no less humbled.

     When last call came, I once again leaned over the bar but this time asked the bartender for our bill.  He looked a bit pained, which perplexed me.  We stared at each other, and then he looked away and said very quietly, “It’s been looked after.”

     “What do you mean?” I said, knowing full well what he meant.

     “It’s been paid in full and please don’t ask me anything else about it.”

     “By whom?” I asked knowing full well by whom.

     “He insisted.”

     “I can’t let him do that.”

     “He really wants you to let him do this.”

     “I can’t.  Our bill must be several hundred dollars.”

     “He really wants to do this for you guys. I tried to talk him out of it but he insisted.”

     “Can I collect cash from everyone and leave it with you so that the next time he comes in he’s drawing against a credit?” I asked.

    “No,” he said firmly.

    At this point I didn't know what to do.  By now a few of our group had caught wind of what was going on.  They too joined in the chorus to allow us to reverse the tab.  Sensing our well-meaning but combative spirit, the bartender finally said, “Look. He needs to do this.  Please let him.”

     Well that’s different.

     And as our comrade in revelry put his tie back on, donned his tunic, picked his white gloves up off of the bar and placed his hat under his arm, we each hugged him with sincerity and warmth… not just for the life affirmation we’d shared with him that night, but for the gift of knowing that for a brief moment in time we were all bound by the ties of a small, closely knit family mourning the loss of one of its own.

Bonds form under the watchful eye of Sam Adams

     I have no idea which of the 343 fallen firefighters we’d had an impromptu wake for that night, but it was an honour to have been a part of it.  To this day a flicker of the life force I gleaned from that experience still lives in me.  It’s been over ten years since I’d reflected on that weekend in Boston, and that embarrasses me somewhat.  In hindsight I realize that the gesture not only of the firefighter but of the bartender who had his back was one of the more subtle but no less important life lessons I’d learned.  Had I not found myself exposed to the random but extraordinarily personal tribute of a firefighter (who like me had never met any of the 343) all these years later, I’d not have taken the time to reflect on that night and how much it shaped the person I became.  So to him I offer my heartfelt gratitude... for other than time itself there is no luxury greater than that of perspective.

Oh look, it's a shiny thing...

Sometimes I can become easily distracted.  It's not always obvious when this happens, but in undertaking the  very ordinary task of purging some old emails this past weekend, I came across a note that was too good not to share.  I won't publish the whole thing (my life isn't t h a t exciting) but here are the meat and potatoes of it that are fit for public consumption.

To set the stage, it would appear that I was taking a break from some yard work last fall when a case of the written runs hit me, thereby - of course - requiring me to share my thoughts with a long suffering friend via email.  Ergo, the following literary gem bounced off a satellite at some point and now exists in perpetuity:

"... my mind was wandering while taking a break from yard work, so I decided to grab a beer, my hockey, stick, and some tape, and retape my stick.  It's fairly shredded and that's disrespectful because I rely on my stick to give me the leverage I need to haul my ass up off the ice after it's been unceremoniously deposited there.  I digress.  Then I moved quickly to the notion that I really didn't have a clue if I was taping it properly, and from there I found myself immersed in how much I loves Ottmar Liebert (Nouveau Flamenco) since that's what was coming out of my iPod as I sat in my recliner on the deck drankin' my beer and pulling year-old tape off my stick.  I never used to incorrectly pluralize the word love but seem to be doing so now, and I wonder if I'm being terribly unoriginal.  And then I began mulling over how my iPod is such a train wreck and my taste in music should not be dictated by this train wreck, and before I know it I'm wondering how The Woody Allens chose their band name.  An incomplete thought since I immediately began giggling about a particularly good bit in Mia Farrow's autobiography, whereby she related how upon being told of Woody Allen's infidelity with her adopted daughter, Frank Sinatra called her up and offered to have his people break Woody Allen's kneecaps.  And bam, I flip to an interview I was reading this morning in which Rick Mercer, when asked to divulge his favorite stuff at home and abroad, said his favorite bar is Allen's (not to be confused with The Woody Allens or Woody Allen), which is my favorite watering hole and has been for years - fantastic food, the best patio in the Big Smoke, and the most wonderful, old school bar with smart people and awesome story tellers pouring drinks.  That brought me around to beer, which somehow tastes more refreshing than usual when consumed on a hot, sunny day on the back deck in mid October.  Oh yeah, I was taping my hockey stick, wasn't I?  I don't think I'm doing it right at all."

I suspect I might have had one coffee too many that morning...

The Essence of Ephron

Brilliant. Warm. Witty.

It’s not unusual for somebody to be described by these terms in death, but to be defined by them in life is.  Nora Ephon’s work, a conduit for her wondrously lived life, never left us guessing how she might one day be eulogized.

She was a genius; a successful journalist, essayist, playwright, screenwriter, novelist, producer, director, and blogger.  Any of us would do well to master one of those, and she mastered all of them simultaneously on the largest stages.

Her name is synonymous with critically acclaimed blockbuster movies that came to define romance for a generation. We all know these movies. Heartburn, When Harry Met Sally, You’ve Got Mail, Sleepless In Seattle, and Julie & Julia, to name a few. But here’s the thing:  This stuff isn’t what she was made of at her core.

Nora Ephron was comprised of so much more than what commonly defines her.  Her gift wasn’t how she wrote, it was how she lived.  Metaphorically, when faced with fourth and goal she ran the ball in herself.  T h i s was her gift.

The daughter of screen writer parents, she wrote for the weekly campus newspaper while majoring in political science at Wellesley College. Once graduated, she interned in JFK’s White House and then moved on to an entry level position at Newsweek.  During a strike by the International Typographic Union she rallied friends and cranked out a publication that parodied the New York Post. Dorothy Schiff, the publisher of New York Post, was paying attention and when the strike ended made quick work of hiring Ephron, giving her free rein to write about anything related to New York City. With that, she honed her skills writing more often than not about sex, food, and The Big Apple. While plying her trade for Newsweek, she began contributing essays to Esquire, New York, and The New York Times Magazine.

If there was any doubt as to the height of ethereal divinity achieved when her heart and head collaborated, consider the titles of her works of collected essays, each of which sucked us helpless and giggling into her stories: A Few Words About Breasts, Wallflower At The Orgy, Crazy Salad, Love, Loss And What I Wore, I Remember Nothing, and perhaps the most inspired title of all, I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Reflections On Being A Woman.  Nora knew… she knew how to speak to us.

But there was more. She was married to Washington Post reporter Carl Bernstein during the Watergate scandal. With him, she rewrote the script for All The President’s Men, and although it was not used it once again got her noticed and lead to her being hired to write her first screenplay. If that wasn’t enough, she maintained from the outset of her bitter separation from Bernstein that she not only knew that Deep Throat was FBI top dog Mark Felt, but that she would tell anyone who asked.  And she did tell anyone who asked but the media seemed wholly uninterested.  When it was confirmed in 2005 that Felt was indeed Deep Throat, Arianna Huffington invited her to blog about it.  Ephron accepted, and subsequently became a regular contributor to The Huffington Post.

I could not bring myself to utter, “Rest in peace” when she died.  I don’t want her to rest in peace.  I want her to walk up to Christopher Hitchens with a glass of wine in one had and a life well lived in the other, kick him in the shin, and demand to know just how funny he thinks women are now.

She was stopped in her tracks before she was done transcribing all of the things we needed and wanted to know about ourselves. Therefore her death should leave us not with a sense of loss but rather with a sense of purpose:  There will never be another Nora Ephron, but surely there is another woman, another deeply intelligent, driven, kind, brilliantly funny, dignified straight shooter who sees the world perhaps not the same way Ephron did, but through the same filters.

Rise up, my brilliant, warm, witty friends.  Rise up.

The Basketball Diaries

I believe writers refer to it as being ‘blocked’.

I’m blocked. 

I haven’t been able to write in weeks.  Now, this is not nearly as big a problem for me as it would be if my livelihood depended on my ability to write, but nonetheless I’ve always been able to write.  I can’t remember a time in my life when words didn’t come easily or (much to the chagrin of everyone around me) in abundance.  So being blocked is a whole new kettle of fish for me and I don’t mind telling you that I am not enamored. 

Lisa (my patient, unflappable, much-tortured editor )… if you are reading this I promise to have a column for you in the next day or two, but for now I think I’m about to, uhm, unblock.  Is that even a word?  (Please confirm). 

For reasons I won’t go into (but suffice it to say my pride is involved), on evenings not jammed up with a thousand other things that ‘need’ doing, I’ve found myself in a schoolyard near my home shooting hoops regularly for the first time in over twenty-five years.  Nothing fancy, just the same kind of shoot-around that I’d run through at the beginning of practice a hundred years ago when I played for real:  Set shots from each of the notches around the key, short jumpers, fade-away jumpers, and layups (but not many because my knees have filed a grievance), and if feeling particularly frisky, my hook shot.  Yep.  I’ve got one in my arsenal.

What seems like a few minutes of playing around always turns into an hour and a really good sweat.  I noticed almost right away that if I got frustrated with the bad bounces the ball was taking that I deferred to softening my touch on the ball… keeping my shoulders and shooting hand square to the work, changing the trajectory to get more arc on the ball, flicking my wrist as the ball rolled up and off my fingers as I released it, and holding my release position until the ball dropped.  If I got frustrated I involuntarily slowed down and applied the soft touch.  And just when I thought this was an anomalous observation, I realized it was in fact a regimental pattern.  If I felt wrong going up in the air I let the shot go anyhow, and sure enough when the ball careened off the rim and caused me to run for my life to catch up with it (which, yes, prompted a barrage of f-bombs), by the time my Sherpa and I arrived back at the key for another go I was mysteriously calm. For those who know me well, let me join you in a boisterous chorus of “what the HELL?”  Because we all know that when I get frustrated, I over think, overreact, overdo, and over(everything) in spades.  So nobody was more shocked than me to realize that for some reason, the pursuit of nothin’ but net was the o n e thing that actually forced my over-thinking head to slow down whether it wanted to or not.  I never want to slow down but lord knows I sure need to some days.  But that’s a whole other ball of wax. 

Usually I’m alone in the school yard but not this night; it was very busy.  There are two hoops mounted on the brick wall at the south side of the school, about 40 meters apart.  Ordinarily I have my pick of the two but I arrived and found both in use, which of course immediately caused my blood pressure to spike.  But I came to play and I was going to play.  At one net, there was a rather heated game of two-on-two in full flight, so I turned my attention to the other hoop, where I found two guys in their mid-twenties playing a very slow paced game of twenty-one.  I had my own ball, so asked if they would mind if I popped off a few shots in between theirs.  With barely an acknowledgement of my presence or my request, there was some general grunting of approval, so I took that to be an overwhelmingly enthusiastic and unanimous approval from the floor.  We toiled at the net together for a while, and when their game ended they left. 

I carried on with my shooting, and about twenty minutes later I noticed a man standing nearby with his young son.  In broken English he asked (as he gestured with his basketball toward the hoop) if they could play.  But of course, I indicated.  For a while we took turns shooting and to be honest, I wasn’t paying much mind to what was going on around me.  But sometimes situations just demand your attention and this was turning into one of them.   I retired to the side of the schoolyard and took a seat on my ball, opened a bottle of Gatorade and (finally) stopped to assess the lay of the land.

This flip flop-attired man?  N o t an experienced basketball player.  His son?  Not yet old enough to  properly hold or shoot the ball with one hand.  I watched them play for about 15 minutes, marveling at their sheer enjoyment of every shot, every miss, every run after the ball, and of course the hysterical high fives when the ball made a rare swoosh through the net… usually from beneath the rim!  I was starting to feel a bit guilty for enjoying their happiness to that degree… almost as though I was interrupting. 

Eventually Dad needed a breather (it was swelteringly hot that evening) and he too retreated to the sidelines.  We both watched silently as his son embraced the absence of elders, suddenly hoofing the ball in the general vicinity of basket.  And by hoofing, I mean, full-on, two-handed, rocket-powered, projectile-launched hoofing.  Each time he released the ball he squealed with delight no matter the outcome, and let me assure you, the point of this was no longer to actually get the ball through the hoop.  That brick wall took a thorough beating.

“Next time… maybe we do… small detail,” says Dad, shrugging his shoulders and grinning.  I giggled; this was pretty funny stuff after all.

But his son stopped.  He looked at the ball in his hands, looked up at the basket, looked at the ball again, slowly raised it as high as he could over his head, and lunging from the waist with feet firmly planted, positively whaled the ball toward the ground about three feet in front of him.  You’ve heard of the bounce pass?  This was the bounce shot.  I’m a bit of a kill joy so I’ll just tell you now that the ball did not go into the net.  It did however hit the backboard and ricochet off it to the inside edge of the left rim, where it caromed wildly to the inside edge of the right rim, bouncing three or four times on the metal before trailing off of the outside edge of the rim and dropping to the concrete below.  And there ensued the most unabashed happiness I can recall seeing in quite some time.  I couldn’t help but laugh (it was so awesome and so funny), and Dad was yelling something I couldn’t make out as his flip flops became a blue flash of light running off to get in on the high five.  Neither of them will likely remember that shot, that it was a miss, or even being at the schoolyard that night… but I was certain that the bonding they experienced in that shared moment would stick with them in some way, shape or form forever.

The clarity I found in identifying and cataloguing that analogy was really quite powerful.  I am reminded once again that life is simple… if we let it be.

Aaand poof:  unblocked.

From InsideToronto.com: Celebrity Musing - Lisa Marie Presley, A Question Of Motivation

Things have been a little bit busy lately.

Yesterday was one of those days that turns me into a cat with a Cheshire grin.  It had everything.  Rest. Good friends.  Good food.  Good wine.  Good laughs. And never to be underestimated in its relevance to good times:  s p e c t a c u l a r weather on a national holiday.  I woke up early and without a plan, kicked my feet over the side of the bed and never looked back after they hit the floor.  Took in Canada Day festivities, hit Ribfest at Whistler's, TTC'd to the Pride Parade (serioulsy... the happiest place on earth yesterday), got my first look at the wonderfully re-purposed Maple Leaf Gardens, walked (yep, walked) to Allen's for supper on the patio (try the Mike Weir 2009 Sauvignon Blanc with the goat cheese dip & garlic toasts if you're in the 'hood), and then against a perfect summer night's sky, watched the fireworks display at Stan Wadlow Park that was anything but "small community" (as it was billed) in scope. And finally, a night cap on the back deck preceded a brilliant, self induced exhaustion.  It's been a month of yesterdays... things have been crazy...

As I sit here today on the same back deck with a cup of coffee updating the blog, I can honestly say I have no clue where the month of June went.  A month ago I was in a totally different place in life than I'm in today, and for some reason, that very moment in time also feels like six months ago rather than just one; time flies.  Another reminder to just get out there and kick every day right in the pants, I figure.  Owing to this level of uhm over commitment, I have - it seems - been neglecting my blog.  So it's time to get cracking.

First up, my June effort for the Celebrity Musing column for Inside Toronto.  I've always been a bit intrigued by Lisa Marie Presley, and when I learned she had another studio album dropping in May, I thought it would be gratifying to poke around and find out what motivates her to continue pursuing a career as a singer and songwriter.  The link is here, but for you non mouse-clickers out there, here's the story.  Hope you enjoy it.

CELEBRITY MUSING: Lisa Marie Presley, A Question Of Motivation

I was recently asked what I'd do if I had the backing needed to pursue my great passion in life.

To be honest, I've been so busy living that I'd never really considered the possibilities. Nobody was more shocked than me when "write" shot out of me like a long-tensed projectile released from its anchor.

In hindsight, I've always loved words and taken great joy out of using the language. As a student I loathed Shakespeare being thrown down as an educational benchmark, so I sustained myself by savouring the sweet reward of the creative writing segments attached to the sometimes months-long study of the pretentious, literary clap trap of England's leading bard.

I digress.

Albeit late in life, I embraced my latent passion and began writing for an audience. No loitering in Venetian cafes sipping artesian wine while scribing literary masterpieces for this girl; I have a career I love that pays the bills, and in my spare time I write for pleasure. Sometimes my stuff is good, sometimes it's utterly deplorable, but for better or worse it's out there for the world to judge and that's just spooky.

Out of this came the realization I do have an audience, and if something I write makes even one person look at another in a softer light, then I have achieved something wonderful simply by risking my pride.

Enter Lisa Marie Presley.

Her third studio album 'Storm and Grace' dropped May 15.

It's impressive that in the shadow of her father she's maintained her determination to have a career in music, given that she launched her career after marrying musician Danny Keogh, raising two children, divorcing him, and marrying and divorcing Michael Jackson - all of which was done without any outward signs she might have musical aspirations of her own.

After releasing her debut album in 2003, she married and divorced Nicholas Cage, and around the same time she released her second album in 2006, she married for a fourth time, this time to musician Michael Lockwood.

In addition to two adult children, she is also the mother of three-year-old twin girls and has relocated to Kent, England. Appearing to have found peace, we arrive at 'Storm and Grace', her first album for the Universal Republic label, produced by 12-time Grammy winner T. Bone Burnett and meticulously packaged by her new manager Simon Fuller, the brain trust behind the 'Idol' franchise.

It's a safe bet nobody asked her what she'd do if she had all the money in the world. She has inherited enough money to do as she pleases and in addition to being a philanthropist and a tireless advocate for children's causes, she has chosen to make music.

Critics and the music buying public maintain their lukewarm reception of her offerings, but she persists caring more for her art than her image.

Celebrities whose agents talk them into cookie cutter careers as 'musicians' (the ultimate Hail Mary pass in celebrity pop culture) are a dime a dozen. But there's something different about Lisa Marie Presley. Perhaps because she makes no apologies, doesn't pretend to be somebody else's kid, blames only herself for her failings, embraces her lot in life and doesn't court the spotlight despite having made a few interesting choices that landed her in it anyway.

So what motivates the daughter of Elvis Presley to stand up and be counted among the musical talent out there, the vast majority of which many would say exceeds her own?

With a modicum of talent, no need for monetary gain and at the risk of humiliation for laying herself bare in an often harsh public eye, Presley offers this: "I'm compelled to do this because I'm a music lover...That's what drives me - pouring your heart and soul into something and hoping that it can change someone's life in some way."

Modest goals born out of manifested passion that might change one person's world for the better. You're OK, Lisa Marie. You're OK.