Haunted by Books - theHumm April 2021

By John Pigeau

As unpleasant as restrictions and lockdowns may be, most of us have found some healthy ways to cope with them and keep our spirits up during this past year’s once-in-a-lifetime pandemic. Baking became a go-to for some folks, as did gardening, both in and outdoors. Cycling made a comeback too, and judging by social media posts, a whole lot of families adopted a whole lot of puppies. And if people weren’t knitting their new puppy a new sweater, it seemed they were piecing together puzzle after puzzle, and normally there was a bottle of wine or a locally-brewed craft beer on the table too. Then there were folks like me: bookworms, avid readers, bibliophiles — who all at once found ourselves at home, with a considerable amount of reading time on our hands, although that was not necessarily a bad thing.

No, in fact, it was sometimes pleasant — like a Snow Day used to be back when we were kids. And as small businesses adapted to lockdowns, a rather cool phenomenon began: you could call your favourite indie bookshop in the morning with a request or two, and have those requests delivered to your mailbox later that day. Like books were pizzas. It was weird. And it was glorious.

For many people, reading is therapeutic. It’s also thoroughly enjoyable and relaxing — a quiet, compelling and richly-imaginative diversion in a sometimes too-loud, too-chaotic world.

For others, reading can be a spiritual experience, a gratifying voyage, a balm for a bothered soul.

“To read is to take stories into ourselves,” says Saskatchewan-writer Harold R. Johnson, whose book Firewater: How Alcohol Is Killing My People (And Yours) was shortlisted for the Governor General’s Award for English-language non-fiction in 2016. “Stories are powerful,” Johnson says, “they shape the world, they shape the way we see things, the way we experience our journey here. To read is to be carried along a path, a road, a winding stair, a sailing ship, a space ship, a thought ship. A book is a journey, and like our life journey, the best part is the travelling, not the destination.”

My friend Hollay Ghadery, author of the forthcoming memoir Fuse, thinks along similar lines. “Reading has always been a preferred means of escape,” she says, “but this year, it’s the only one — besides being in nature — that truly feels like an escape. Holding a bound paper book in my hand loosens the digital tether that has become an even more permanent fixture of my life. Reading reminds me there are worlds beyond this one; there’s hope.”

Shelley MacBeth, owner of Blue Heron Books in Uxbridge, Ontario, a beautiful bookshop that has twice won The Libris Award (for Best Bookstore in Canada), knows the value of a good book.

“Personally,” she says, “reading as a ‘transporter’ is everything. It could be solace, escapism, intrigue, provocation but… the right book? Totally immersive.”

A deeply absorbing book can be mesmerizing. For me, a single sentence can be mesmerizing — and it can snag me, as they say, hook, line, and sinker. As this one did, written by Hilton Als, in the “Forward” to Joan Didion’s Let Me Tell You What I Mean: “A peculiar aspect of Joan Didion’s nonfiction is that a significant portion of it reads like fiction.” That’s when a voice in my head says, yes, yes, yes, now please tell me more. Why is that? And I settle into my chaise lounge chair, pull a soft throw snugly over my shoulders, and dig in. Often, I’ll have read a dozen pages before I think to look up again at my surroundings. Still raining. Cat’s curled up in her blanket near the window. Fan is whirring. Hmm. Then I’ll relocate my place on the page and read on: “‘I ransacked my closet for clothes in which I might appear invisible in class,” Didion remembers, “and came up with only a dirty raincoat. I sat in this raincoat and I listened to other people’s stories read aloud and I despaired of ever knowing what they knew.’”

I felt a recognition, then, in how Didion felt — dread, wanting to disappear; almost sick in the uncertainty that the stories she wanted to tell were the stories people wanted to hear. A chill fell over my shoulders. That was me in high school, I thought. That was me in university. That was me when I was writing my first novel.

In recognizing ourselves in others, through books, we become more connected. We feel less alone, less adrift perhaps, and sometimes less afraid. The less afraid part strikes me as significant during a catastrophic global pandemic. What a blessing it is to be made to feel less afraid, to be gathered safely in by the solace of shared experience. It is not itself like a vaccine that will render one immune to an oft-deadly virus, but it is a bridge of comfort. And for the time being, we can use all the comfort we can get.

Little wonder that, when I’m in need of inspiration, I spring to my feet, walk hurriedly to my kitchen bookshelf, pluck out my timeworn, dog-eared copy of Norman MacLean’s A River Runs Through It and Other Stories, flip to a well-marked page, and drink in these lines:

Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it. The river was cut by the world’s great flood and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs.

I am haunted by waters.

I read that passage three, maybe four times a year. Every time it leaves me breathless, in awe. And sometimes its beauty brings tears to my eyes. Always, the elegiac words that end MacLean’s novella ignite in me a firestorm of inspiration. And I am filled with gratitude to the author for leaving us such profound and soulful beauty.

I am haunted by books.

Kaajuk Kablalik — Art is My Medium for Preserving My Inuit Culture - theHumm April 2021

By Sally Hansen

Art… and Soul

When I think of jewellery, I don’t usually think of walrus whiskers or whale baleen, but these natural materials feature prominently and beautifully in Kaajuk Kablalik’s distinctive pieces. Originally from Rankin Inlet, Nunavut, Kaajuk (friends call him Kaaj) loves working with the materials “from home” that inspire him to promote and preserve his Inuit culture.

He is used to questions about the unfamiliar components that make his earrings and necklaces so different fr......

Haunted by Books - theHumm April 2021