I am 45 weeks into this project. Ninety percent complete. I should be heady and elated over the prospect of being done, but that is not the case. Instead, I’m edgy and intense. As if the few thousand words remaining might not be enough for me to figure out the point of my experiment. Perhaps this is how an author feels when they’re nearing the end of a book–praying that...
A while ago I stopped by Bed, Bath & Beyond to pick up a vacuum filter. It was all I needed that day, the one and only thing on my list. Still, I managed to arrive at the checkout with a cart full of stuff. Specifically a bunch of 400 thread-count Egyptian cotton sheets that I convinced myself would never, ever, go on sale again. I hate this lingering impulsiveness...
In the late spring of 1989, on a Friday night at a trendy restaurant in downtown Toronto, I stood up (with several drinks in me) and announced to a gathering of girlfriends that I wanted to become an actor. For context, I was there celebrating my upcoming nuptials, and, no, I’d never recited a line of dialogue or stood on a stage in my life. My admission was spontaneous and...
The first time that I ever lied about my age was a couple of years ago. Up until that point–excluding my underage attempts to get into R-rated movies and be served alcoholic beverages– I’d been truthful about my years. The indiscretion in question happened when at my writing group. By the way, I love my writing group. I’ve been in this one, the Tuesday nighters, for about five years. The...
There’s so much noise around turning 50. Does one deny being a half-century old? Embrace the achievement? Fight like the devil to turn back the clock? Without question, this age instigates a new chapter with bigger stakes and a growing sense of urgency. Given our youth-obsessed culture and my own compulsion to stay young, I wondered how honestly I could write about this milestone. Fifty on Fifty is my experiment.
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