At the Republik, A Special Education

There's a couple of places in A Special Education where the historian in me is forced to take a little nap. I talked earlier about the Wagbeard concert being a few years too early, something I'll probably change, but there are others that will remain. For example, I remember wandering around downtown Calgary during my first summer as a parking lot attendant and seeing gig posters for Nirvana at the Westward Inn (although its the Republik that Jack and Isabel visit). Nobody knew who they were at the time, and I think it was rumoured that twelve people showed up. I know two guys who claimed to have been there, and they say they only came to see Dave Grohl who they admired from his time in Scream.

I have a moment where Jack takes Isabel to go see a local band she's been dying to meet. They're opening for Nirvana and the place is empty. The teens are there to meet the local band during sound check and when they arrive, everyone is ignoring Nirvana.

I once read an interview with Bob Mould in which he said the first time he saw Nirvana was in Canada, as they "unleashed Endless Nameless on an unsuspecting audience", so in my mind, this is the song the band is warming up with as Jack and Isabel arrive.

Forgotten Pieces

[Deep in the process of revising Games of Chance, amalgamating secondary characters and streamlining subplots, I stumbled across this stub of an article in the early pages of the journal I'm using to write this particular novel. It's unfinished, and I believe it's from August 2004, since I remember writing it at a cafe over breakfast in Montreal, a city I visited in 2001 and 2004. I still believe the problems addressed here are among the major problems facing Calgary, but I was struck by the recognition that I felt "aloof" in Calgary, as that feeling of "aloofness" is a major theme of Games of Chance.]

Another City, Not My Own

My wife and I had been planning a trip to Montreal for quite some time. It was the only place in Canada that we could agree on as interesting. We had been to Montreal once before and enjoyed it's streets and shops. It was the antithesis of my home town Calgary, in the West of Canada.

Please note that I have used the awkward phrase "West of Canada." I have picked my words deliberately here, avoiding the semi-republican separatist connotations of "Western Canada" and the historically colonialist implications of "Canadian West." I like "the West of Canada" as it alludes to the sprawling nature of our country while turning Western Canadian alienation into an amusing Elmer Fuddism.

I must admit, growing up in Calgary, I never felt alienated. Quite often aloof though, as if Canada was something that happened over there, somewhere else, but not around here in Calgary, with its new suburbs and wide open spaces. There was never anything that tied me to this thing called Canada and I often longed to be a part of something more than vast empty prairie.

To me, Montreal was where Canada happened. Maybe I'd viewed too many Expo posters in the childhood bedrooms of my aunts and uncles; but everything about Montreal whispered "Canada" to me. Quebecois separatistes might disagree and say that Montreal is an integral component of their "distinct society"apart from Canada. Historians too,might point to Montreal and say that is unique to all of Canada, with its blend of French and English, Europe and North America, but to me that's what the rest of Canada should have aspired to become - neither old world nor new, a phrase too often taken to imply our cousins below the 49th Parallel and their state of perpetual "now-ness."

This has been my problem with Calgary. Both Calgary and Montreal experienced tremendous periods of growth after the Second World War. Montreal, already sitting at close to a half million citizens, exploded with suburbs and then reinvented the inner city neighbourhoods, superimposing modernist structures, like office buildings and expressways on pre-modern urban landscapes. Calgary, on the other hand, had very little to build upon and so just built out with reckless abandon. there was nothing to preserve and so my hometown has preserved nothing. Forget trying to find a building that dates from Calgary's incorporation barely over a hundred years ago, it's hard to find something from before the Second World War. The downtown core has been completely worked over, save for two or three blocks and every year hundreds of pre-war homes are run into the ground to make way for in-fills and condominium complexes.

I am not against modernism, or the march of progress, and I know that some Montrealer's feel that the same processes of historical erasement is underway in their city too. Leonard Cohen complained that the construction of bland square box offices over top the Victorian houses on St. Laurent were destroying the soul of the street - over fifty years ago. I am sure there are those who say the same about the many condominium conversions going up all over the place now. What bothers me is that despite all of its modernization, Montreal as managed to maintain its identity and character whereas Calgary's identity and character is becoming synonymous with its sprawling soulless suburbs. The sprawl creates problems, many of which Calgarians want to ignore, such as the environmental resource mismanagement that results from having the lowest housing density in Canada with one of the lowest occupancy rates at 2.1 people per dwelling and 1.2 automobiles. This sparseness prevents small residential businesses from succeeding, keeps public transportation from having the necessary critical mass to become cheap, efficient, and allow for anything but rush hour delivery of workers to and from the city's core. The net result is the direct inhibiting of the type of great city character that Calgarians so desperately want.

Bridgeland during the World Cup

Welcome to Calgary's Bridgeland, where even the street boxes are set up to cheer for Italy!

Passages: Celebration of the Bow

Saturday morning I had the pleasure of joining a group of Calgarians in Douglasbank Park who had gathered as part of Passages, the City's celebration of 100 years of Water Management. Saturday's event, led by Alberta artist Peter von Tiesenhausen, saw us drop 100 small handcrafted wooden boats into the Bow River from the Higgins Bridge.

Each boat was filled with one of 100 soil samples taken by Tiesenhausen while on a journey to Calgary from the Bow River headwaters in Banff. Each sample yielded a different colour, and mine was a nice light brown, reminiscent of espresso crema. Since each boat is loaded with a GPS-tracker, it is theoretically possible to follow each boat along the Bow and into the South Saskatchewan River, on to Manitoba, and ultimately (possibly) out to the Hudson's Bay, making it all a kind of elaborate game of Poohsticks. For those of you keeping score at home, my boat is #50, while one of my colleagues was #26. We're going to check in on our boats in September to see who owes who a cup of coffee.

The City of Calgary has quite a few events scheduled over the summer as part of their Celebration of the Bow series, and I'm looking forward to the floating of lanterns from Edworthy Park to Pearce Estate Park during the evening of August 21 since it will take place within walking distance of my house.

Out of Time (Ped Xing)

(circa 1997)

My house was quiet. Every creak of every floorboard felt like some kind of giant thundering across the yard. I had been home all day alone, stuck in a funk, a bout of moodiness that hung around everything I did. I couldn’t shake it, so finally gave in, tired of the internal struggle. I called it quits and headed to bed before ten o’clock at night, only to find that now, a sudden restlessness had come over me and every sensory input fed me some kind of energy. I tossed and rolled, but to no avail. Looking for some shoes and loose change, I decided on a late night walk.

I headed to the home of Chris Scappio, night owl extraordinaire, hoping that he could provide me with the release that I was looking for. A soft glow emanated from his basement window, the frame still retained a hint of winter's snow, indicating that Chris was still up and about. I rapped on the pane of glass and headed towards the backdoor, where Chris met me.

"Couldn’t sleep. Thought I’d drop by. Whatcha up to?"

"Work. Optimization. I'm almost done" He said, inviting me in, then heading back down the stairs. Chris ran a webpage development business out of his parents’ basement.

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah," Chris gave a gruff little laugh, "I was going to stop by your place in about ten minutes."

"Really?" I moved towards an old faded red sofa intent on relaxing while Chris went about his business.

"Yeah, I slept in till like two o'clock today, so I figured I'd maybe go visit Frank or something." He looked at me. "You a game little monkey?"

"Sure. I’m up for that. I was looking for something to do. I had my own Brian Wilson episode today, too." I flipped through one of the many magazines that Chris had strewn about his floor. Waiting, I helped myself to some peanuts from a small jar shaped like a jawbone and watched Chris' fingers dance over the computer keyboard. “Did I mention I might be buying a new truck this summer?” Chris said. I was surprised and congratulated him. “If I can land a few more of these business accounts, I should have enough money to buy my own truck.”

Soon we were picking up slurpees from a nearby seven-eleven, and afterwards I found myself sitting shotgun, inhaling the familiar scent of the interior of Chris’ truck. I tried to recall how many times this scene has repeated itself over the years. How many restless nights had we spent, through all seasons, in this little red pickup, heading for parts unknown? Happiness might be a warm gun, but freedom is a full tank of gas and a set of keys.

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Welcome Spring!

Almost all the snow has melted from the city parks and fields, giving my hometown the illusion of springtime. A chinook earlier this week had everyone out in shorts and on patio decks as the temperature hit twenty degrees celsius. Children frolicked. Old people smiled. Lovers embraced. For a hours in the middle of the week it was as if I caught a glimpse of a happy future: Spring.

Aspects of my professional work are seasonal and March always signals the beginning of the home stretch and I can feel the stress start to melt away.

*For the record, I remember watching this video on a grainy pirate VHS tape in the backroom of some nightclub with dozens of other eager music fans. This was the closest we could get to the real thing. I made a lot of friends that night squished into that tiny room trying to make out the blurry on-screen images. Now YouTube makes it all available at the press of a button, but without the possibility of future friendships.

Am I Parking My Car, Or Storming the Beaches?

Dear City of Calgary,

I know I said some mean things about your street cleaning policy that left the city side streets full of snow. At the time I was angry, because in my neighbourhood, this meant that two buses got stranded in the snow side-by-side for almost a week, cutting off traffic flow in one of our major exit routes, in addition to the other roads that were impassable due to accumulated snow, or the snow the plows had pushed forward at interactions.

Now however, as the warmer weather hits, I see a new stunning logic to your plan. Those mounds of snow piled up in the middle of interactions have transformed from snowdrifts into hard icy barricades, and the four feet of slush, snow, and ice on either side of the road have turned the parking lanes into a veritable No Man's Land. I often find myself wondering, am I parking my car? Or storming the beaches of Normandy? It really is thrilling to launch my car at a two foot ice ramp in the right hand turning lane, hoping my forward momentum will carry me out of the curious mix of gravel, sand, snow and ice awaiting me on the other side. It used to be finding a parking space was difficult - now there are places aplenty and every time I get back into my car I get the vicarious pleasure of worrying whether this will be time my car gets stuck. The little twinge of excitement and fear as I skid out into the street - truly one of life's little delights.

So thank-you City of Calgary, for making all this possible with your inefficient (if cost-saving) snow removal strategy.

Summer Heat, Summer Memories

It's been unseasonably hot here in Calgary over the last few days. Yesterday set an all-time heat record. Driving across town in the middle of the afternoon yesterday, I overheard this song on CJSW. Not suprisingly, it makes me think of New York. But so do heat waves. In part this is because when I was in New York doing research for my thesis, Tune In, Turn On, Go Punk, the city was in the middle of a late summer heat wave.

It also doesn't help that the heat wave theme turns up in a lot of New York-based movies, such as A Guide To Recognizing Your Saints, In America, and perhaps most memorably, Do The Right Thing.

From The Rooftops Of Calgary

A couple of days ago, I woke up grumpy. I overslept and it threw my rhythm off. I missed that quiet part of the morning where I enjoy a cup of coffee and do some writing, or read a chapter of a book (something I haven't managed to do in almost a week, by the way). But I went for a walk. My daughter came along, riding her bike, as we went down to City Bakery for some fresh bread. The women who work there gave us some treats, I bought some coffee. We sat in the park and then came back home. We all came back very happy.

A lot of time people try to decide where to live based on the size of house they can afford, or the kind of schools that are nearby. Sometimes they choose it based on commute times. When was the last time you heard about someone buying a house based on the neighbourhood's ability to make them happy? How do you monetize that? How much is it worth to live near a nice view of they city, or tree lined streets?

Words and Music

With temperatures breeching thirty degrees celsius almost every day this week, I think it's fair to say that Calgary is in the middle of a mid-summer heat wave. For some reason, the heat has me thinking a lot about the Ocote Soul Sounds' Alchemist's Manifesto, loosely inspired, I think, by Paulo Coehlo's novel The Alchemist, which celebrated it's tenth anniversary this week.

Two other bands I've been thinking about lately are Calgary's Ded Souls and Beyond Possession. I've been making a lot of notes for a story that's partly based on growing up in Northeast Calgary, and these two local bands have been providing the soundtrack in my head. The Calgary Cassette Preservation Society has the Ded Souls available, but I'm kicking myself for not picking up the Melodiya Records-backed Beyond Possession reissue ten years ago. I guess I'll have to console myself with this (and other) YouTube clips. This one was recorded a short bus ride from where I grew up:

And remember kids, Beyond Possession is Beyond Possession!

Bridgeland's Spooky Forest

Urban development is a strange thing. Something of a mixed blessing, since one person's charming locale could be another's vision of blight. When I moved into Bridgeland ten years ago, it had already begun being redeveloped, albeit the pace of gentrification and in-fill development would quicken was the housing boom really took off.

When I moved in, small scales were the normal; single family, one and a half story homes, hovering aroudn the one thousand sq.ft. threshold. Closer to the hill, north of Fourth Avenue, two-story homes predominated, and the large million dollar in-fills had already started appearing on Drury. My wife and I used to walk home from City Bakery on First Avenue to the tiny little house we were renting on Colgrove Avenue at the top of the hill. We would often come up by way of Drury, dreaming perhaps of living in a house with a view of downtown from the ridge (the house we were renting had a gorgeous view and only Drury offered better ones).

Once my daughter was born, we would continue to walk home the same way, but my daughter always fussed along that particular route. Eventually she told us that she didn't like walking through the "spooky forest". The blocks of 8th Street south of Fourth Avenue are heavily canopied, to such an extent that the street is mostly shadowed throughout the day. The picture above, for example, was taken at noon today, when the street gets it's most sunlight. I must admit, to a three year old it must have looked quite spooky, particularly in the Fall.

In general, I love my neighbourhood, but the I am often surprised to find myself saddened by the development of a fourplex at the corner of 8th and Fourth. It's the bright spot on the distant corner.

Prior to the fourplex, that particular corner was perhaps the spookiest part of Bridgeland's Spook Forest, comprising of not only more trees, but nestled in and amongst the trees were three or four small working man's cottages, the likes of which I had never seen anywhere else. I've include a link that gives something of an impression of what the cottages looked like, except they were smaller. One cottage was barely wide enough for a large man to extend his arms. The shae from the trees had killed most of the grass and plants, so none of them had much of a garden or lawn. Sometimes my wife and I would cross to the otherside of the street, half-expecting Boo Radley to emerge from one of them. Between ourselves we referred to the cottages as Shack Row.

Then, one summer, the cottages and the trees were gone and I've missed them ever since.