Missing peace

I'm a lucky guy. Anyone can see how fortunate I am. There is plenty of food on my table. There's art on the walls. I'm in my own home. I am surrounded by friends, who are wonderful, supportive and talented people. I have the love of my daughter and my lady to keep me glad. We celebrate the birthday of my cat, for heaven's sakes. I've got it good.

Of course we all know being well fed and well loved doesn't make a person happy. But in my opinion, any complaint I make is a direct insult to the 99% of the world's population who are plainly worse off than me. If I can't be happy with what I have, I suspect there's no hope for happiness anywhere. So I work at it, and the results are good.

Good is good. Good may even be as good as it gets, at least for a householder with commitments and responsibilities and goals and aspirations. There's a reason why shamans live alone, and monks and nuns live in cloistered poverty. It's hard to bring your spirit to the next level with earthly things weighing you down. I understand that. I can bear the weight, I think.

I suspect I'm always on the path, even when I think I'm staggering around off in the bushes somewhere. I'm at peace with my journey for the most part. I'd like to achieve enlightenment, to raise my consciousness (or rid myself of its nagging chatter) and to become some kind of integrated being. The only trouble is I can't see how I would do that without turning my back on the world.

And so I muddle along, the man who has everything, relatively content to defer my shot at perfection so I can get a few things done in the real world: Grubby, gritty reality. So be it. And I put on a happy face, and I feel happy.

Today my troubles amount only to this: I have misplaced the picture I took of Terry Fox, running up the yellow line along the middle of Highway 17. I've told the story and sung the song, so many times and with all my heart, and now it seems the picture has gone.

I'm trying to understand this, to accept it, to let go. And I do, almost. I just call it my missing peace...

Gettin' Back Home

Well, this has never happened before... I've become a character in a song.

It's a good song, too.

Brenda Neiles wrote it, apparently inspired by a long and mostly quiet drive we took together from Ear Falls, to Winnipeg.

I can't put my feelings about this into words easily.

Just listen... and tell me what you think.

(Right-click on the link, choose "save target as" and download the MP3 to your desktop)

The Buddha by the Parkway

Like most working stiffs, I commute to work every day. My route takes me along the Don Valley Parkway, that clogged artery that feeds the rhythmic thumping of Toronto's urban heartbeat. Southbound morning traffic hardly moves at all: one great, peevish snake sluggishly coils and compacts from the Lakeshore all the way up to Newmarket. Northbound is better, but not much. From about the Don Mills exit it's stop & go until the traffic spews onto the 401 east and west.

Betwen Don Mills and York Mills, where the traffic first starts to slow to a crawl on the northbound journey, there is a grassy, litter-strewn section of the median strip that widens into an elongated tear-drop shape. From the middle of it, giant light standards and hyrdo towers loom over the lines of cars, and - for a few minutes every day - me, and my quiet desperation.

Thankfully, that desperation is modulated by quiet contemplation of the Buddha by the Parkway. I don't know if anyone else can see him sitting there, but I sure can. Every mindless moment of every meaningless journey flows inexorably under his steady, even, inward gaze. He just sits there, cross-legged, head slightly bowed, taking it all in without judgment, without pity, without pain and without worry.

The Buddha by the Parkway isn't really there. All that's really there is a crumbling concrete form sprouting out of the median strip that looks like a Buddha might sit nicely on it. But the longer I look at his absence, the more present he seems to be. I feel more present in turn... see, drive, think, move, sit, think, be. Me.

I've thought about buying a two-foot backyard Buddha from a garden centre, and setting him on that pediment in the middle of the highway for everyone else to see. But that would be making a public statement about something I can barely even understand in myself.

And anyway, a representation isn't the real thing. So the Buddha by the Parkway wouldn't be there even if it was... but the Buddha that isn't there, is! And I, for one, am grateful.

The North is a Spirit

Last Thursday night I headed out into the darkness to hear Ian Tamblyn up in Orangeville. Of all the songwriters I know, he seems to work most directly with the ideas that move me both as an artist and as a spiritual seeker. Ian's songs, stories, photos and compositions are expressions of solitude, sublimity, awe, and grace. In a time and a place where these notions are frequently pressed into service as buzzwords, it's a refreshing and at times a deeply moving experience to get back to the heart of the matter.

And what is the heart of the matter, precisely? Ian phrased it as a query that went something like this: is the North in Canadian art and music an idea, which we're applying onto the landscape, or is it a spirit that we're discovering there and then expressing?

Ian's not the first guy to take ask this question, implicitly or explicitly. Artists from the Group of Seven to Glenn Gould have tackled the North, or been tackled by it, and it's never been officially settled. I can't place myself in such noble company, but I can tell you I've been obsessed by the same thing. As a kid from the Canadian Shield near Parry Sound who spent 6 seasons in the bush as a treeplanter, I've been chasing the North in story and song all my life. The more I think I get it, the more it gets me.

Then again, I'm convinced the answer to the question is less important than the effort that goes into trying to work it out. But on the way to Montreal last Friday night, in the dark space between Brockville and Cornwall where many of my songs have been conceived, these words came to me in a dark, ancient-sounding melody. They're only words, and you can make of them what you will. But when I sing them I know what they mean, and I believe these words to be true.

The North is a Spirit
You'll know it when you hear it
In the cry of the loon
Beneath a waning moon
You'd better try to understand it
And when you finally begin to
You'll see the North is a Spirit
And the Spirit gets in you....

Defying Anthropology

I said I would write about the highway up to Parry Sound and Sudbury sometime, so I will. I'll start by telling you that the old Highway 69 was the most dangerous highway in Ontario. I'm not exaggerating. The winding two-lane trail to cottage country and the north was the cause of so much carnage, I can't even begin to describe it. I personally knew at least a dozen people who died crashing into the rock cuts or over the embankments of that lovely, but deadly road. Whether it was overflowing with tourist traffic in the heat of the summer, or coated with black ice in the dead of winter, Highway 69 was a killer. But it's gone now...

The whole time I lived up in Parry Sound, various governments promised that the highway would be flattened, four-laned and fixed. Ironically, the last two people I knew who died on 69 were killed right where the old highway met the new Highway 400 coming north. But the progress continued, and now it's nearly done. Only the short stretch across the Native reserve south of town remains unchanged, and now that the band has reached agreement with the government, that will be renovated too.

Which means that when I drove up to Sudbury last month, I drove to my hometown along a brand-new highway 400, through a countryside I had never seen before. The little gas stations, camps and hotels that had lined the old road were somewhere through the forest. The winding little highway had given way to a vast, flat, fresh grey macadam through an apparent wilderness of trees and lakes and rock. It's a sublime road. Not beautiful, but sublime: a large, impersonal, modern, and perfectly executed freeway through an achingly ancient landscape. It was fascinating through the sleet on the way up north, and astonishing in the endless sunset on the way back to the City.

But the most incredible thing about this new road is not the new beauty of the old forest, recently revealed. And it's not the marvels of modern engineering that make it so fast and sleek. It's not even the apparent disappearance of that old highway I knew so well. It's the new rock cuts. They're going to defy anthropolgy.

There were always rock cuts, but they were small and narrow. Now, that four lane highway cuts through near-mountains of precambrian shield, leaving monuments the size of the Egyptian pyramids, already dotted with Inukshuks, towering over the road. This is some of the oldest rock in the world. It dates to the cooling of the earth's crust. Nothing has even marked it since the Ice Age, and even that just left a few scratches.

But long after cars have come and gone, long after roads have lost their meaning, long after our civilization has bloomed and faded and been forgotten, these rock cuts - brand new blasts out of the earth- will be standing still. They won't have moved. They won't have softened. They will still be there ten thousand, a hundred thousand, even a million years from now.

And the people of the future will know somebody made them. That much will be obvious. But they'll have no idea why, or what they were for. They will never be able to guess what led people to change the crust of the planet itself in this strange way. They won't know about all the deaths on the old road. They won't know about the politicians and the promises and the programs. They won't know about the cottagers, the traffic jams, the little hotels and camps that are almost forgotten already. They'll just know that something important happened here. And the rest will defy anthropology.

Northern inspiration

I love the city of Sudbury. As a kid growing up in Parry Sound, it was a big city "only" 99 miles north, and as such, a destination for shopping, restaurants, adventure, and incidentally, my first ever rock concert: Triumph in the Sudbury arena, on the Thunder 7 tour! I'm fond of the toughness of northern towns like this, with their gritty aura, their fading taverns, their haphazzard town planning, their odd juxtapositions of faded economic glory and new government money. I like the rocks, the trees, the trucks, the cold. I like the hockey feeling in the air. I like the cheap draft - $3.35 a pint - in weathered old watering holes like the Towne House Tavern. I like trains running through the middle of town. I like the northern Ontario accent, with its French and Native nuances. And I must admit, I like liking these things, knowing that not everyone does.

As of two weeks ago, though, I think a few more people are convinced. The Ontario Conference of Folk Festivals brought about 500 musicians, artistic directors, radio personalities, and miscelleneous other members of the Ontario roots music scene to "The Rock" to do business and play music for one righteous weekend. The music community is still abuzz with the warm feelings that were generated in this cold city, and none more so than me.

A lot of good things went on, from the official showcases and workshops to the impromptu late night jam sessions. Hands were shaken, cards were exchanged. Awards were handed out. New contacts were made and old ones renewed. Synergies were formed. Pints were lifted. One heck of a lot of songs were sung, and it just felt great. I imagine anyone who was there would say the same.

But for the record, here are my four personal highlights, in no particular order:
1) Performing with signer-songwriter James Jones for the Grade Sevens of Lansdowne Elementary School. I'm not into being overly political, but I must point out that the 45 minutes we spent amusing and bemusing them with our acoustic music was THE CLOSEST THING TO A MUSIC PROGRAM THEY HAVE EVER EXPERIENCED. We are doing our level best to create a society of uncreative I.T. drones, it appears. Musicians, take note: the children of your society need you like never before.

2) Watching the Manitoba ensemble Das Macht SHOW! play an impromptu concert in the Ramada Hotel elevators. Song finishes, everyone claps, the doors close and they disappear. 2 minutes later, they reappear, having played for the other floors along the way. The best part: the security guard, drawn by the noise, shows up - just a second too late to see what was going on. Confused by the gathered audience, he looks around, hops into the empty elevator, and disappears. Two minutes later, the doors open- and there is the band, playing yet another tune! Where the security guard wound up, no one knows to this day...

3) The Towne House Tavern. I can't tell you how many folkies confessed to me that they were intimidated or put off by this classic northern bar and concert venue. I'm sure they must have changed their minds by now, but let me state the case to be certain: yes, the place looks rough. So would you if you had been standing on the same corner in Sudbury for 50 or 60 years. Yes, they sell Northern Ale, not Fancy Urban Beer. (Which I also enjoy); Drink up, it's cheap, it's local, and it's made of good northern Ontario water. Yes, there are pickled eggs behind the bar. It's a cultural thing, trust me. You don't have to eat them, it's just good to know you can. Finally, if anyone remains unconvinced, I will simply point out that the graffiti in the men's washroom at the Towne House Tavern in Sudbury is the smartest, most diverse, and most interesting graffiti I have seen anywhere.

4) Driving south on Sunday afternoon. Even the sky didn't want the weekend to end; the sun seemed to take 3 hours to set; approximately the time it took to get from Sudbury to Barrie. And for much of that time I was driving on the new highway 400 through my old stompin' grounds in the Parry Sound area. It's one heck of a highway, for good and for ill, (I'll write a whole piece on that later), but the key thing in this instance was that it's opened up a whole lot of really beautiful bush that looked absolutely spectacular in the intense golden light of the late autumn sunset.

Those are my highlights. There weren't any low lights. The weekend was so magical, even the cold weather made me feel warm.

My 24-Hour Vacation: Part Two

6 AM, July 6th. I've been up all night and there's no point sleeping now. The sun is up and it's already warm. There is hardly a soul astir in Orillia, and even Highway 11 is practically dead. So I decide to take off for Honey Harbour, where I have a date with a white pine tree, cross-country.

Being from Parry Sound, I have a pretty good idea of the geography. I know that Highway 12 goes right from Orillia to Waubashene, where I can turn north onto 400 (formerly 69.) I know I'm north of 12 at the moment, but I figure if I just head west, chances are I'll hit 400 anyway. There's virtually nothing in between. On the off chance that doesn't work, any county road that heads south will take me to 12. This is how my mind works. I even checked the gas guage. Foolproof.

If you're expecting a disaster, there isn't one. True, the roads that run parallel to 12 don't go straight through to 400 from Orillia. In fact, they only run parallel for maybe 15 miles. Then they go at right angles. Then they turn to gravel. Then they turn to cow tracks, through some of the most gorgeous, untouched, old-fashioned farm country I've seen in quite a while. I guess not having through roads is one way of preserving the landscape. In any case, I had one of the nicest Sunday drives I've ever had, notwithstanding the fact that I drove in circles and zig-zags for about an hour, enjoying the stillness of a morning alone, before hitting Highway 12 and heading west.

And then I got a hankering for Tim Horton's.The problem is, once you get north of Barrie, the formerly ubiquitous Timmie's is a rare find. There isn't one in Honey Harbour, or Port Severn, or Waubashene, or poor, forgotten Fesserton, once a bustling gas-station town on the main route between Barrie and Sudbury; now an eyeblink along old Highway 12. So to get a cup of coffee on a sunny Sunday morning, a guy has to head PAST highway 400, west to Midland. Or in my case, to Penetanguishene, having managed to miss the Midland turn.

But what a treat: it's at least a 15 mile drive off the highway to Penetanguishine, and I was in no hurry. The landscape was getting rugged as I approached Georgian Bay, and I could feel my blood stirring for a sight of the water. The Bay is home to me.So it already seemed like the day couldn't get any better, and what should come on the CBC radio but good old Jeff Goodes' program Fresh Air!

I felt a real kinship- Jeff had been the MC the night before at Mariposa, so he must have been up all night too, as the program airs at 7 am and he was already fresh. Only 12 hours before, we'd been chewing the fat backstage, trading memories from the Gordon Lightfoot Tribute concert last winter, and now here he was with his coffee already metabolized, talking about how great Mariposa was the night before. But that's not all!The best part was, Jeff had hauled out tapes from a Mariposa festival about 30 years ago, on Toronto Island.

This was an incredible, historic event- it would seem like an urban myth if I hadn't heard it with my own ears. But it's true: a couple of young up & comers named Bruce Cockburn and Murray MacLauchlanwere the talk of the town that weekend. They were joined by a few old friends of the festival who "dropped by:" Gordon Lightfoot, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young and Bob Dylan! Sounds like not a bad lineup to me. I didn't get backstage for that one, but sipping on a medium regular, munching a chocolate croissant, staring out at Discovery Harbour from the Penetanguishene wharf, I came as close as I could to travelling back in time. Thanks Jeff.

Okay, so I've already had a huge day, and it's only about 7.30 am. Caffinated enough to keep the car on the road, I decided to make a beeline for Jay Ingram's cottage. Did I mention I had a date with a white pine tree? The tree is on Jay's property, in an undisclosed location not far from Georgian Bay. Only Jay was awake when I pulled in at 8 AM. He was grinning down at me from his deck, looking like Obi-Wan Kenobi in his white hooded t-shirt. He took me tip-toeing around the side of the cottage to see a turkey vulture, warming its wings in a nearby tree. He fed me more coffee, woke up his son Max, and we proceeded down the driveway with armloads of tools to build A Treehouse.

Carpentry in the forest. What could be better?I spent a few hours getting covered in pine gum, banging two-by-sixes together as the day lengthened. What a treat to join in with a boy & his dad building stuff. Had a great lunch with the family, and then turned with a sinking heart back toward the city. I nearly fell asleep behind the wheel on a gridlocked highway 400, but I got home alright. By 4 PM I was treating myself to a long, deep sleep, dreaming in the shadows of my 24-hour vacation.