"Better than having no goals at all"?

As you can probably tell by now, I have a little-little bit of a problem with Facebook. Generally speaking, what makes me gag is the narcissistic posturing of authors who are glad to play down their recent bestseller/literary award so long as you know all about it. And then there's the "PLEASE, people, don't even attempt to friend me because I have very few spaces left in my 5000 limit! I just don't believe people have an excuse to think they can approach me at a time like this, when *I* will hand-pick my last few friend requests from my most loyal supporters." Ad nauseam.

But this took the (let-them-eat) cake. This is an actual Facebook post, with actual responses that I don't think are meant to be ironic (though there is always hope). The people posting the comments are sniggering over the fact that a 29-year-old woman hasn't even finished high school and considers it her educational goal. You can just feel the disdain, even contempt for someone that age who is so ignorant that she doesn't have a high school diploma. Not only that, but going back to high school is painted as something unworthy, if not shameful, something she should have done at the proper time (as they no doubt did). I had something to say about this, although I do not believe there will be any more comments, except perhaps to take me on for being "negative".

I've left names on this time. All this has already been on FB, so why not? I'm still trying to stop gagging over their ignorant superiority and "at least. . . " condescention. That sardonic ". . . again. . . " was the killer. What if someone said that at someone's second wedding?

Peerless Kent: Last night, I had a coffee date with a 29 year old girl at Starbucks. At one point, my date shares with me that she has the itch to go back to school. I was curious, was the goal to complete her bachelor's or master's? Turns out, she was talking about finishing high school.

Ella Winters *Stunned crowd* Well at least she wants to do that wink emoticon

Maria-Luiza Popescu Better having that than no goals at all. smile emoticon

Laurie Schmidt Lee PA At least she wants to try...again.....

Margaret Gunning  Imagine the obstacles in the way that must have
kept her from finishing high school to this point. I really am surprised
how negative the response has been here. Is this sort of a "let them eat
cake" thing? She may have been forced to work to support herself (and
others?). She may have had personal or health problems. The fact she
wants to go back now is incredibly courageous, especially if others are going
to disparage her goal. This is just my two cents, not trying to start a fight
and people can believe what they want. But there's a meme going around
that people post, but don't really practice: be gentle with others, because
everyone is fighting a battle that we know nothing about. I don't think "oh
well, at least. . . " reflects that view, but seems to say, "is that all she wants
to do?", as if a Masters. or post-graduate work is more worthy and will lead
to a better job. I have it on first-hand authority that it often leads straight to
the unemployment line.

Post-Blog Boggle: I was too incensed to cut and paste this reply from Peerless Kent (whose name gives you an idea of his mindset), but the gist of it was, "Hey, Margaret, I'm with you all the way on this, but she was a party girl living on a trust fund and really didn't seem to be very serious about this. But she seemed like a nice person, so I'll do whatever I can to help her." 

In focusing on only one example, and judgementally/disparagingly at that, he completely missed my point about educational goals, as did his Greek chorus of lackeys. Hey, this girl is a loser and perhaps a hooker, sucking the system dry, so why should we take her goals seriously? But hey, "at least" she's doing something. . . finally. . . 

BLOCK PEERLESS KENT.

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The United Church: the NDP at prayer

Since going on Facebook, I keep finding old Chatham pictures/names of people, places and things, and it just jolts me because I have not thought of these since I left there in 1969. I found a very good pic of Evangel Tabernacle, which was across from us on Victoria Ave. Seeing it again gave me a weird mixture of wonder and heebie-jeebies. I used to hang off the bar at the front door and pretend I was riding a horse (?). An upside-down horse, I guess. I must have been very young. 

When I was growing up, we just knew without being told that Evangel Tabernacle was somehow unmentionable. For all we knew, "negroes" went to it (though I never did find out). The Catholics who went to Blessed Sacrament in their short-pleated-skirt uniforms were similarly unmentionable. For years and years, I didn't even know what a Catholic was, but we all knew enough to stay away from them.

I grew up in the United Church, and until Russell Horsburgh blew it all apart for us in the mid-'60s, we weren't much more exciting than the Methodists and Presbyterians who had melded together in the 1920s to form us. Though Horsburgh poisoned the well pretty quickly, the waters were muddied by the fact that he wanted to welcome black families into the congregation. This caused great consternation from the get-go. It was seen as one more stroke against him - that, and the fact he was homosexual (which was obvious, because he was in his 30s and not married). 

This takes nothing away from the more repellent and abusive aspects of his ministry, which eventually imploded because there was just too much evidence against him. But the people asked to testify in court were kids who had been under his power, and no doubt the good reverend had spoken with them and asked them to please shut up. Though he was eventually convicted and served a few months in jail, the whole thing was overturned when somebody carelessly set a match to his files. And back then, the thought that a minister would do something like that was simply unthinkable: he was a man of God, for Christ's sake!  He threatened to make a triumphal, I-told-you-so return to Park Street United, but I doubt if he followed up on it. It was just an idle threat, yet another way to lick the blood and feathers off his lips after his victory.

There was a horrible echo of the Horsburgh affair towards the end of my more recent attendance in the United Church.  In a very short space of time, our new minister had turned our formerly-reasonably-functional church into a war zone. The congregation splintered into viciously adversarial factions, and as far as I am concerned it never recovered. He was ousted in less than a year by the larger church, but he left scorched earth in his wake. I now wonder why I put myself through all that. Every trauma I ever experienced as a child at Park Street United returned to haunt me and make me sick. But trauma survivors suffer from an awful sort of extreme loyalty that is difficult to break away from. It's hard to understand unless you're one of them.

I didn't storm out of the place, but became gradually disaffected over a period of several years as "worship" became more and more an empty, even boring experience. I knew enough not to speak of it, or I would be asked to solve the problem and make it more interesting. Having survived the storm, no one wanted to rock the boat, and I think unhappy people were just keeping their mouths shut. 

All this aside, it is repellent to me what has happened to the United Church in recent years. It is now not much more than a group of left-wing atheists. It has been called “the NDP at prayer”, but it’s worse than that now, it’s “we-think” of the lowest order, dispensing with any kind of theological emphasis. I wonder what they do at services now. I suppose they have the same old ladies doing bake sales, but eventually they will all die off. I remember a friend of mine saying “we have some young women in the UCW now”, but they were all in their 40s and 50s. 

It’s that fustiness, and the hymns, my God, why do people bother going? It’s all hypocritical, as if anyone cares about Jesus or God any more. Even the more recent moderators say you don’t have to believe in God, but back when I was trying for re-entry in 1991, they wouldn’t even let me in without a refresher course. I had to be re-confirmed before I could be a member again because (they said) too many years had gone by since I had attended. 

My parents were incensed with this (I had to phone them to get my baptismal and confirmation records, which they - incredibly - had saved), because they had been told that if I was baptised as an infant in the United Church, I would be a member for life. But the church now required those documents, or I would not be allowed back in. I was re-confirmed after taking an eight-week course, writing a personal creed and passing a fairly rigorous interview by the minister, but - wait, there's more - I also had to go through a kind of formal re-entry during a service, with three "real" members laying their hands on me. 

Why was it important to be a member, and not just an "adherent" who was allowed to attend without formal membership? Well, you had to be a member to be able to vote at the annual meeting, that yearly four hours of dire financial prognostications. You'd leave three inches shorter than when you came in. But at every annual meeting, the membership rule seemed to be waived and anyone who had attended could vote. This was due mainly to low turnout.

This seems extreme now, and with the church hemorrhaging numbers every year (though, not so strangely, some claim that it's not true and they're doing just fine if you adjust for NDP membership), they would probably let just about anyone in by now. Certainly, you no longer have to believe in God any more because the moderator clearly doesn't.

At last count they were down to 400,000 – less now, probably, and will die off naturally because no one wants to wear orange to the service every week. If people do join, they are expected to take on a ready-made, left-wing political agenda, though of course this will be strenuously denied. How can you think that? Of course you can believe anything you want! How can you accuse us of that kind of oppression? What's wrong with you, anyway? If you're not happy here, you can always go worship at that fundamentalist church down the street. You know, that brick building on Victoria Avenue that says JESUS SAVES on the front. 

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Skeletons in the Rectory: the Horsburgh Affair

I don't know why I started digging for this today. It was like excavating through a thousand layers of decaying horseshit. I've written about this before - the scandal in Park Street United Church in Chatham, Ontario, in the mid-'60. This episode, which found its way in fictionalized form into my second novel Mallory, involved  the  Rev. Russell Horsburgh, a charismatic but fanatical minister charged with "improprieties" with a young people's group. After being found guilty and doing some time in jail, he latched on to a good lawyer and had the conviction overturned.

I was ten years old when all this happened, so I wasn't in the young people's group, but I remember Horsburgh and the fear and hatred he inspired in his congregation. My parents in particular found him repellent. I remember standing outside the church after choir practice and hearing drunken teenagers yelling for "the Rev", which was his nickname with the kids. These kids weren't tipsy, they were holding each other up, vomiting-in-the-bushes drunk. One kid called another kid "Boozy Bozo". Do I have a memory for this sort of tiny detail? Trust me, I do.

I was good at overhearing things in those days, mainly because nobody would tell me anything. I remember my Dad's best friend calling him a "psychopath", and my mother saying, "well, you know what they found upstairs in that apartment. Empty whiskey bottles. . .and worse." I didn't understand the reference then, but I am assuming, from my slightly more sophisticated perspective today, that she meant condoms, no doubt used.

I believe those kids, and I believe what they tried to say in court, but it's obvious to me that they were bullied, intimidated and made to feel foolish. They were also shamed. No doubt there was a taint of immorality, of "looseness", particularly among the girls, and lack of moral propriety. After all, a minister couldn't encourage kids to do things like that. It just didn't happen. It was a no-contest as far as power was concerned. These kids didn't remember things because they were told not to remember. But I saw them, I was there in the midst of it all. I heard the murmurings, and I know all this stuff really did go on.

I found another article in the Ottawa Citizen from several years later, recounting Horsburgh's triumphant return to Chatham for a dinner in his honour. His loyal supporters (these people always have them) sang "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow, and referred to the "utter garbage" spewed at the trial, all of it meant to maliciously drag his innocent name through the mud. I remember the last names of some of the people mentioned in the article - names I have not heard in a very long time. They were people my parents profoundly disliked.

I was able to lift this fragment off a newspaper morgue site, but the only way to obtain the other one - noisome as it is - is to transcribe it off the computer screen by hand. I can't even do a capture. Trust me when I say that at his victory party, Horsburgh was drooled over for FOUR hours, while he smiled to himself, realizing that he'd gotten away with the whole thing.


Teens Testify Rector OK'd Use of Apartment for Sex (September 22, 1964)

CHATHAM, Ont., Sept. 21 (UPD)  A witness said today it was common knowledge among the young people at Park Street United church that the apartment above the minister s office was regularly used by teenagers for sexual intercourse.

The testimony came from a 16-year-old youth in the government's case against the Rev. Russell D. Horsburgh, 45, rector of the church.

The rector is charged with eight counts of contributing to juvenile delinquency by encouraging and supplying accommodation for teenagers to indulge in sex parties.

Earlier in the day, the boy's 14-year-old girl friend broke down during cross-examination by Cy Perkins, defense counseL

The youngsters testified that in mid-March they went to the minister s office and the cleric told them there was nothing wrong with sex if it was done correctly.

"Everybody's doing it," they quoted him.

In giving her direct evidence, the girl told the prosecution that the minister read a booklet about sex to them, and that the youth said he would like to try it. She said she was frightened, and the Rev. Mr. Horsburgh told her there was nothing to be frightened about.

The girl said that she and the youth went upstairs into the apartment directly above the minister s office and had intercourse.

Doesn't Remember Text

In cross-examining the girl, Perkins asked if she remembered what the minister read to them. She said no, only that it had something to do with sex. Perkins produced a United Church booklet which contains what the church believes to be the Christian attitude toward sex and marriage. Perkins asked:

Is this the booklet he read from?"

"I don't know, I don't remember," she replied, and broke into weeping and had to be taken from the courtroom for 20 minutes. When she re- turned her mother was at her side, and remained there dur- ing the rest of her testimony.

The girl was on the stand for 2 hours, and took up the entire morning session and part of the afternoon.

Her boy friend testified this afternoon, saying that "everyone knew what the upstairs room was used for," and that "the reverend got a kick out of it."

Tells Dance Incident

The youth also told of an occasion at a church dance when he said he had seen two people leave the dance and go to the apartment. He said that he informed the Rev. Mr. Horsburgh, and that he and the minister "snuck up the stairs" to the apartment, turned on the lights and found a boy and girl indulging in intercourse.

He said they watched for "l0 seconds, until the man told us to turn out the lights." He said the minister turned out the lights and left.

The Rev. Mr. Horsburgh sat beside his attorney with a pad of paper, taking notes on the testimony, and at times looking with a slight smile at the witnesses.

CODA. I will transcribe the end of the Ottawa Citizen piece, because it makes me want to scream. In an "eat crow" gesture, Horsburgh claims he will return to Park Street United, making the jaw-dropping statement that he fully expects "reconciliation" with the congregation (meaning, forgiving and forgetting the whole thing). His reasoning is, he got off, therefore he must be innocent, and the church owes him this reconciliation because they now have to admit they were wrong. They owe it to him because they're supposed to be good Christians, after all, so how can they let this wrongful accusation continue to hang over his head? The truth has triumphed at last, so to feel any other way than welcoming is uncharitable and even mean-spirited. For God's sake, they should get over their pettiness so he can return to Park Street United in triumph!

"I have to attempt a reconciliation with the congregation at the church," he said. "At this stage reconciliation is more than overdue. It would be a shame if the congregation at Park Street couldn't find it in their hearts to achieve reconciliation with me. It would seem in keeping with the principles of Christian brotherhood."

Dig down one more layer in the Horsburgh horseshit, and you will see a self-protective agenda: if he "reconciles" with these people, and may God forgive them if they aren't willing to do it, he's less likely to suffer from any more accusations of wrongdoing. The boat could yet spring another leak as deeper abuses emerge. In these cases, even today, we generally only see the tip of the iceberg. Just twist it around like all abusive thugs do, turn the onus on the people to be good forgiving Christians, and they will likely keep their mouths shut forever.

POST-BLOG THOUGHTS. When I saw these three photos of Horsburgh, they nearly made me jump out of my skin. The first time I tried to find anything on him on the net - ANYTHING - I came up empty. Then years later, a postage-stamp-sized, grainy black-and-white picture. No articles. It took a hell of a long time to turn up anything from this sealed tomb of corruption. Finally I dug up a very detailed two-part article in the Chatham Daily News, and while it was overly sympathetic to Horsburgh (mentioning that he was about to welcome black families into the church and was shouted down), it did fill in a lot of details that made the mosaic of my memories more coherent.

Now we have these crystalline things, and where on earth did they come from? This man was completely forgotten. To see his face again was very disturbing, for he looks exactly the way I remember him. I take it he never "reconciled" with Park Street; that gullible they were not. By then we had long ago moved on, and attended a Baptist church for two years, one of the most hair-raising experiences of my life.

But that's for another day.

I will recount one bizarre piece of memory. Every week my family had something newly scandalous to grapple with, thinking they were out of my earshot, but my earshot was big as a satellite dish. One week the church bulletin looked very strange indeed. One whole page was covered with typewritten x's. I mean, the whole thing. My 20-year-old brother Walt, who thought the whole thing was just one big hoot (he never attended Park Street) held the bulletin up to the window and saw that there was text under the x's:

 “You ungrateful people should be ashamed of yourselves. . . . I am sorry I ever freed you from the tyrants and the papists. You ungrateful beasts, you are not worthy of the treasure of the gospel. If you don’t improve, I will stop preaching rather than cast pearls before swine.”

It was signed:

Martin Luther
Russell Horsburgh

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Soon to be a Major Motion Picture?

Or not.

But I can see it.

Do I harp on this? Oh God. So I apologize to my three or so really loyal, die-hard readers who will soon peel off because they're sick of reading this.

EVERY author wants a movie version, and it's not just so they can move a few copies. If it's "literary fiction" - the kind nobody reads - the need is even more imperative. Otherwise our publishers will just sigh over us and get very depressed. But I swear to you, I swear to you, in this case it's different.

The Glass Character, my third published novel, revolves around the life and times of one Harold Lloyd, the silent movie guy who hangs off the clock in his most famous film, Safety Last! Though it isn't a Lloyd biography and isn't even "about" him, strictly speaking, without him the novel would have no heart, no soul or even a core. What it's really about is fandom in its more extreme form, the story of a young woman who will do anything, anything at all to get close to her idol, even to the point of tossing her life into the fire.

And she does, but even that isn't enough. As she hurtles through one incarnation after another, as bit-player, secretary, waitress in a speakeasy, high-class hostess, screenwriter, and (finally!) novelist, Harold dances in and out of her life, maddening, intoxicating, irresistable.

Almost daily, I have to tell myself: this story has legs. It not only has legs, it has wings. Though I'm the only one who thinks this, at this point, I try to keep the door of possibility open. Why? Because I am an utter lunatic.

I fell in love with Harold watching The Freshman on Turner Classics. I tuned in halfway through, during the disastrous dance sequence where, piece by piece, his cheaply-sewn suit falls apart: the dream we all have of being naked in public, but done in an awful, slow-motion striptease.

I began to realize I was watching a genius who made you laugh till you cried, but in truth, what he was doing was about as funny as a dental cleaning: one slip and the hygienist is going to hit a nerve and you will be in agony. But because he is just so exquisitely good at what he does, that jab never quite happens. It threatens, and we watch his suit, and Harold, fall apart (though never in a way that cries for sympathy). But we're just this side of it, and not just laughing but going "ohhhhhhhhh" in that way you do when you're watching something that plays very skillfully around the edges of social humiliation.

Which, of course, we all love to watch.

So that was it. I needed MORE, more, more MORE Harold Lloyd.

I had to find out more about Harold Lloyd. It was piecemeal at first: whatever far-out-of-print books I could get from Amazon (hardly any), YouTube snippets, internet and Wikipedia entries (slipshod and contradictory). When I found an old VHS tape of Kevin Brownlow's superb two-hour documentary The Third Genius (now, FINALLY, available on DVD with the Bluray of Safety Last!), I was in Harold heaven. The Harold Lloyd Comedy Collection, a boxed set with most of his stuff after about 1919, rounded out my knowledge, but it only made me hungrier.

For.

More

Harold.

Lloyd.

One day I was sitting in my office downstairs (we now call it the Cat Room because our new cat eats in there), and it hit me like a brick to the head. Harold Lloyd. I HAD to write about him, had to had had had to, and I had no idea what to write. But with the typical idealism of the mentally ill, I pulled myself up to the computer and began to write.

Three hours later, I looked up, looked down, and realized I had started my novel.

I can't and won't spill the rest of it here, except to say - God, my gut, my soul - it took THREE YEARS to get a book contract, and it was flukey. I had sent out so many dead-end queries that I was ready to give up (not: I never give up), but there were a few I hadn't heard back from. I sent out three emails, and only one came back: "Oh! Yes! We'd like to see it, please."

Just like that, except trying to sell a book now is just about as pleasant as a root canal. I just don't know how to do this any more. But with a certain stupid doggedness, I still believe Harold deserves another shot at the big screen.

I've gone through several casting sessions, and I won't tell you the exact details of this except to say we have a fold-out bed in the cat room. Jake Gyllenhaal was a front-runner for a while because he has the same head-shape, hairline, jaw, and bow-shaped lips, though the nose is wrong and the eyes are more dreamy than piercing (Harold had an unsettling gaze). But somehow it wasn't a good-enough match, and as he beefed up and became more of a jock, I became restless and discontented.

I took on Zachary Quinto next, mainly because he was so damn dishy in Star Trek. He had a sort of Mediterranean quality which didn't quite work however, and a sort of gravitas that didn't match the mercurial Harold.

Then I hit on - very recently - Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and bing bing. Bing! He could do this, even if the physical resemblance isn't too strong. He has the compact body type, the lovely big head, the charismatic eyes, and the fizzy frisson I am looking for. And the energy. Oh, the energy.

Why do I do this, when it does me absolutely no good? Any movie people who ever see this might say, "God, she's so naive she thinks she can cast a movie that will never exist." Probably true. But it's not that, not that at all.

This movie is here already, it's made. It exists. It only has to be put up there. Don't tell me I'm crazy, please. I am convinced that, no matter how hard Harold worked on his movies, piecing them together gag by polished gag, they were born in his heart and head first, and it was a whole thing and it only had to be actualized. That's what a good workman does, and hell, he was one of the best.

The Glass Character exists as a movie already. It is there, it's a whole thing, and it only has to be actualized. Just put it up there, please. Harold needs to live again.

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Let's have a party, let's save a life

MEDS COCKTAIL PARTY SEPTEMBER 10th World Suicide Prevention Day

SEPTEMBER 2, 2015 ~ LA SABROSONA

I’m hosting a party here at my spanglish familia on Thursday, September 10th, 2015

WHAT IS IT? It’s a blog event to promote awareness of suicide prevention, to mingle and meet others, promote your blog, get out of your comfort zone or isolation and get your message out there. We’re here to listen and celebrate you.

WHAT DO I NEED TO DO BEFORE SEPTEMBER 10th?
In order for this party to be rockin’ you need to tell all your friends where to meet up and when. This means it would be golden if youREBLOG this post.

The Internation Association for Suicide Prevention (IASP) suggests that people light a candle near a window at 8pm on September 10, 2015.

You are more than welcome to do that.

WHAT I ASK THAT YOU DO ON SEPTEMBER 10th:

a) Come here and post in my comments
1. Your diagnosis (or your loved one or friend)
2. What meds you’re taking
3. How you’re currently doing
4. And anything you’d like to share regarding suicide and suicide prevention
b) Or, write your own post (you’re welcome to use the graphics here) including answers to these four questions and link my blog to your post, or do that ping back thingy :) You can also put “meds cocktail party” in your tags list.
c) Leave a link to your blog (in my comments) and check out at least 1 or 2 new blogs and say hi
On September 10th, we’re going to raise our ‘glasses’ in memory of those who have taken their own lives; we’re going to toast to the unbelievable strength and perseverance we all have; we’re going to forget that we’re loners and hermits and check out someone else’s blog and wave and say hi.


PS. Wear comfortable clothing and don’t forget your dancing shoes and some deodorant or perfume to ‘freshen up’.

I can’t wait to see you all here. Don’t forget to reblog

La Sabrosona xxx

Blog glob: I have to admit that my sensitivity about this issue is so excruciating that I first thought this invitation (slightly reformatted, as I didn't want to just post a link) was some awful, jabbing satire. Yeah, right - loonies getting together to have a cocktail party with their meds! What a completely ridiculous idea that the "mentally ill" can even THINK of doing any kind of social event, even an online one. They can't get out of their rooms, they can't get it together to blog because they're in a drug-induced haze all the time just to try to cope. We all know that. It's the kind of "joke" you hear all the time, and I find it viscerally painful. I had to read it a few times to realize this is a real event, good-natured and fun but with dignity and a serious purpose. Or at least I hope so - I hope it's not like so many other things, where I somehow can't tell if it's satire or not, or serious, something human for human beings to have fun with and learn from. It HAS to be, or the human race is in very deep trouble indeed.

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A night of sheer TERRA!

A long, dirty gif

He was beautiful

He was beautiful, beautiful to my eyes,

From the moment I saw him 

sun filled the skies.

He was so, so beautiful, beautiful just to hold,

In my dreams he was springtime, winter was cold.

How could I tell him what I so clearly could see?

Though I longed for him, another trusted me completely so I never could be free.

Ah but it was beautiful, knowing now that he cared,

I will always remember times that we shared.

Now it's all over still the feelings linger on,

For my dream keeps returning 

now that he's gone.

For it was beautiful, beautiful, 

beautiful to be loved.

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Puss In Boots (Musical Play - Children's Record Guild)

A serious contender for Harold?

For that small-but-loyal band of followers and merry men/women who have been patient with my Harold-rants for the past few years, let me at last present something dizzy, sunny, fizzy and funny and fine. 

I just figured out who's going to play Harold Lloyd in the movie version of my novel, The Glass Character. (A movie version that doesn't exist yet - that lives only in my imagination. So far.) This is a game that's gone on for several years now, and until Jake Gyllenhaal beefed up a little too much, he was a front-runner, being just awfully good-looking, not to mention a very fine actor.

For a while I was transfixed by Zachary Quinto, but to be honest I wonder if he has enough movie experience, being mostly a TV guy. And he's perhaps a little too Mediterranean, though very handsome, with that movie star big head. But his innate gravitas kind of eliminates him from the running.

But listen up, something just happened. A while ago I read an interview with Suzanne Lloyd, Harold Lloyd's granddaughter. The usual question came up: so who would play Harold in "the movie version"? (which did not exist at all then, except as an extremely abstract concept). She mentioned Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and when I quickly looked up pictures of him I thought: uh-uh. Doesn't really look like him.

I had to go away for a while. 

            

There's such a thing as a "quality", and it goes far beyond physical resemblance. In Harold's case it's a kind of mercurial energy, along with charm and boyish sweetness, but with an underlying intensity. When I started looking at clips, looking at pictures, looking at his track record, watching his movies, I started to think that this at last was a true contender.

A contender for what? A movie based on my novel? Preposterous idea, and I have been severely sniped at a few times for even daring to think of it. "Thank you very much for the opportunity to look at your 'movie-ready' manuscript. Unfortunately, this is an idea that we believe would have no mass-market appeal." Canadians love to shame each other for daring to have enthusiasm or (worse!) ambition, and believe me, I've been through the mill. 

But like in some monster picture, the dream just keeps on resurrecting itself, the Thing that Wouldn't Die. Who knows. Who knows? Could be, I think, and though I have no idea what the next step is, if there even IS one, it all has to start in my head and heart, where Harold has lived since that fateful day in 2007 when I pulled myself up to my computer and began to write.

Could be! 

Who knows? 

There's something due any day; 

I will know right away, 

Soon as it shows. 

It may come cannonballing down through the sky, 

Gleam in its eye, 

Bright as a rose! 

Who knows? 

It's only just out of reach, 

Down the block, on a beach, 

Under a tree. 

I got a feeling there's a miracle due, 

Gonna come true, 

Coming to me! 

Could it be? Yes, it could. 

Something's coming, something good, 

If I can wait! 

Something's coming, I don't know what it is, 

But it is 

Gonna be great! 

With a click, with a shock, 

Phone'll jingle, door'll knock, 

Open the latch! 

Something's coming, don't know when, but it's soon; 

Catch the moon, 

One-handed catch! 

Around the corner, 

Or whistling down the river, 

Come on, deliver 

To me! 

Will it be? Yes, it will. 

Maybe just by holding still, 

It'll be there! 

Come on, something, come on in, don't be shy, 

Meet a guy, 

Pull up a chair! 

The air is humming, 

And something great is coming! 

Who knows? 

It's only just out of reach, 

Down the block, on a beach, 

Maybe tonight . . .

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