Newfoundland Space

Ecology versus Development in Witless Bay (The Telegram).

I've often thought that traditional outport Newfoundland ideas of space are at odds with legal and commercial definitions of property that originate elsewhere. In Newfoundland, how space can be used and who can use it doesn't follow the atomistic individualism of post-World War II North America. That said, the "old way" also holds that a man can build a house wherever he wants, if the land's unclaimed and not in use. 'Zoning' a space to protect it from development is just as alien an idea as the modern suburban housing development.

Newfoundland Store

Riding transit to Port Credit for a wedding. I read Alistair MacLeod. Stories of small towns in Cape Breton. Socio-economic gravity wells. The obligation a young generation has to the dozen that came before it. A crushing weight. A man is killed while fishing. Another man is injured while mining.

We found a Newfoundland-Britain import store in Port Credit. I was astounded and then excited. However, it was terribly disappointing. There was a box of square milk lunch, a bottle of purity syrup, and some partridgeberry-apple jam. It is like NFLD sent me a signal, but a weak and meaningless one.

Travel Writing

Today I was in a bookstore's travel section. I browsed books about places I've already been, not places I want to go – not Scandinavia or Argentina, but Ireland, where I lived for 8 months.

The longer I spent in a place the stronger the impulse to read about it. I always, always look for books on Newfoundland, or the Newfoundland section of books on Canada.

I guess I want to judge the depictions, to see if they got it "right." Usually they get something wrong. Or maybe I want to check my impressions and memories against someone else's.

Now it's time for some poetry

I won't post poetry often, but it'll happen from time to time.

This place bleeds through itself.

Neighbourhoods blur,
turn cities into cities,
and we're somewhere other
than where we were,
like the earth is a magician
and we are its dove,
in two places at once,
tucked in the sleeve of the land,
waiting to be produced

—unlike the islands I've known.
The us-them shorelines
look like tyranny,
feel like freedom.
Islands are magicians

that won't do sleight of hand,
that won't saw you in half
then make you whole.

No,
islands are more into voodoo,
pinpricks and curses.

Come, Thou Tortoise

I’m gonna write a paper on Jessica Grant`s Come, Thou Tortoise. I’m gonna do that by May 28. I told some nice people I’d present it then. So I’m nervous that it’s yet unwritten.

I can’t wait to start. I think Come, Thou Tortoise is a rare book. I loved reading it. It’s doing something new and important. It makes a claim for Newfoundland’s difference, but it decouples it from cultural/historical essentialism. Grant’s Newfoundland is a queer space that’s accessible to any weary weirdo soul who needs it.

It’s also goddamn funny and heartbreaking. As I said, a rare book.