Fun show on escape… I blab on starting at around 20 min but listen to the whole thing.

For book review go to the last 10 minutes of the podcast. (Worth it even though they repeatedly mispronounce my name and wrongly say that my partner’s name was mentioned in the actual story… but oh well.) 

June 22, A Literary Picnic at the Luminato Festival 12:10 pm, stage 3

June 23, Box Summer Salon 8 pm, The Rivoli, 334 Queen St. W (backroom)

July 23, Leacock Summer Festival 8 pm, Leacock Museum National Historic Site (In Orillia but, hey, bonus if you drive out there, Wasaga Beach is like an hour away)

September 28, Kingston WritersFest 4:30, Belluve South, Holiday Inn Waterfront (In Kingston. Duh.)

International Festival of Authors (Toronto), Banff-Calgary International Writers Festival and Vanvouver International Writers Festival dates TBA.

 It’s difficult to describe what doing 50+ emotionally draining interviews and meeting people and reading press about myself has been like. But here’s one experience that should sum it all up nicely. 

I did a reading in Winnipeg. It was at the end of a very busy day but lots of lovely people showed up and there was a solid lineup to get books signed. A young woman approached my table and said she came all the way to see me because she heard me on the radio and wanted to meet me. She was born with FAS and herself was struggling with addiction. She blurted it all out and it was intense and heartbreaking (for her to say it, for me to hear it), and we both started crying and grabbed onto each other’s hands and had this crazy moment. I asked her to hang on because I wanted to talk to her some more, later. She came back at the end with an older couple who… bought her my book (she couldn’t afford it). The couple’s own daughter was still drinking, the mother said in a shaky voice, and the father couldn’t even speak.  They left with the young woman, with their signed books, and it was suddenly very hard for me to dwell on the one shitty article that came out earlier that day in the local paper.  

Anyway. Onto the newest review:

And then this lovely review, too in Mom Faze.

I understand those sentiments. Truth hurts – it hurt me to admit it. But why not tell the truth? Addicts can be ugly and sad and selfish but they also need help and compassion. Badly. So that’s one thing. Another thing is very simple: it’s that I write and I am a story teller and I wanted to tell a story of 11 months of my life. I wanted to report it with a sharp, clinical eye, without dressing it up, softening it. I had an image of telling my story, face to face, to your face and your face unable to look away. But once you’re done listening, you can, of course, look away.

I understand people’s sentiments when they read my memoir – I understand why it makes them angry, uncomfortable. I understand the rage about the fact that I drank while trying to take care of my son – the boy who is the love of my life. But why did I not protect him from me? I have tried but part of my problem was that I was so ashamed to admit that I had a problem… because there’s so much shaming around addiction. Because we’re told to keep certain things “private.” Because I was hiding, keeping my family hostage, making them hide too.

I’ve been asked over and over about my choice to tell my story over my choice to expose my family to possible scrutiny: “What will your son think?” I don’t know what my son will think but I hope that he will come of age in the world where we don’t hate people simply because we don’t take the time to understand them or because we have preconceived judgments about them. I hope he will have an open heart and lots of questions.

“Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.”

― Marie Curie

I know you’re reading this because you’ve been following me obsessively on-line for quite some time. Well, this time I reported you for cyberbullying. I have a feeling we’ll talk soon, again, this time on my terms. Have a fun day.