CANADIAN

HOSPITALS
DON’T TELL YOU PAGE 30

STALKED BY A POLAR BEAR

PAGE 46

ME, MY MOM SKIN CANCER,

AND SEARS FIRST-HAND
PAGE 40 PAGE 68

WHALES TO THE RESCUE

PAGE 74

HOW TO REBUILD TRUST

PAGE 62

LEARN TO GARDEN LIKE A PRO .....................22

DIAGNOSING FOOT PROBLEMS ......................25
THE TRUTH ABOUT WEDDING PLANNING......96
SUDOKU, PUZZLES, WORD POWER AND MORE!
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 Contents MAY 2018

Cover Story Drama in Real Life

30 50 Secrets Hospitals 46 Stalked by a Polar Bear!
Don’t Tell You After crash landing in the
What patients need to know Arctic, a Russian pilot must
for their own well-being. battle fear, hypothermia and a
L I SA B E N DA L L very persistent predator. J U ST I N
NOBEL FROM POPULAR MECHANICS
Family
40 Me, My Mom and Sears Heart
WAYNE SAWCHU K

For Megan Murphy, mourning 56 Ramadan Revisited

the end of the department store Observing the month of fasting
is about much more than was painfully lonely—until I
nostalgia for sensible slacks found community. PAC I N T H E
and sales ladies with perms. M AT TA R F R O M B U Z Z F E E D

Life Lesson
62 Cultivating Confidence
How to rebuild trust.
DILIA NARDUZZI

P. | 84 COVER
PHOTOGRAPH
BY DANIEL
EHRENWORTH
 Vol. 192 | No. 1,149
MAY 2018

Health Department of Wit

68 Skin Cancer: 82 To Be Continued…
It Happened to Me What if the cameras had kept
SY D N E Y LO N E Y rolling after these legendary
F R O M B E ST H E A LT H movie lines? J E R E M Y WO O D CO C K
Environment Editors’ Choice
74 The Ocean’s 84 Caring for Comet
Unexpected Heroes How a seriously injured gelding
We know humpback whales put transformed a writer—and
themselves in danger to save novice horsewoman’s—life.
lives. But why? E L I N K E L S E Y D O N N A KA N E
F R O M H A KA I M AG A Z I N E F R O M SU M M E R O F T H E H O R S E

P. | 82

READER FAVOURITES

9 Finish This Sentence 67 Rd.ca

JULIA MONSON

13 Life’s Like That 81 @ Work

20 Points to Ponder 100 That’s Outrageous!
45 Laughter, the Best Medicine 104 Quotes
54 As Kids See It

2 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 P. | 10
Home
22 Planting the Seed
Held back by memories of
failed veggie patches past?
Grow What You Love author
and organic gardening teacher
Emily Murphy weighs in on
what you’ll need to turn your
black thumb green.

Health
25 Foot Pain Explained
How to avoid shoe-related
ART OF LIVING problems. SA M A N T H A R I D E O U T

Health
10 Giving Lifts 28 What’s Wrong With Me?
Retired trucker Margaret Foster A medical mystery resolved.
Hyde pairs long-haul drivers SY D N E Y LO N E Y
with dogs in need of a ride.
KAT H E R I N E L A I D L AW

Culture
14 RD Recommends GET SMART!
Our top picks in books and
movies. DA N I E L L E G R O E N 96 13 Things You Should
Know About Planning
The RD Interview a Wedding
16 Strongest Together A N N A- KA I SA WA L K E R

Come From Away creators

Irene Sankoff and David Hein 98 Brainteasers
on their hit musical and why 101 Word Power
they choose to focus on hope.
103 Sudoku
AARON TATOR

CO U R T N E Y S H E A

4 Editor’s Letter 6 Contributors 7 Letters

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 3
 Editor’s Letter
Navigating Hospitals
A TRIP TO THE HOSPITAL can be joyous (a birth) or routine (a blood
test), but most often it is just stressful. Many, if not all, of you will be
familiar with the undercurrent of tension that pervades emergency
rooms, ultrasound clinics and oncology departments across the country.
Whether we are there for ourselves or we are accompanying loved ones,
these visits are difficult because our health, and our very lives, depend on
the alertness and skills of health care professionals. The stakes are so high
and yet we often feel powerless.
Recently, I sat in a pale blue gown for hours, waiting
as my scheduled surgery was pushed back again and
again. The medical staff bustling around me were
very busy, and my natural inclination was to avoid
distracting them from their tasks. But as time
passed, I reminded myself that asking questions
was my right. The answers to my queries ended up
providing comfort and helped me prepare for
what lay ahead.
This month’s cover story was inspired by the
editorial team’s desire to both inform and help
protect Canadians. Our tenacious health writer
Lisa Bendall consulted 125 different sources to
compile the most salient advice, which you’ll
find in “50 Secrets Hospitals Don’t Tell You”
(page 30). I, for one, will never again neglect
to ask my physician if I can record their
discharge instructions—my recovery
could depend on it.
ROGER AZ IZ

Send an email to
[email protected]
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rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 5
 Contributors
LISA BENDALL DANIEL
(Writer, “50 Secrets EHRENWORTH
Hospitals Don’t Tell (Photographer, “50
You,” page 30) Secrets Hospitals Don’t
Tell You,” page 30)
Home base:
Toronto. Previously published in Home base: Toronto. Previously
Zoomer and Glow. My advice to published in Bloomberg Business-
anyone in hospital? Keep your week and The Fader. I think we
strength up—eat healthy, do any struggle to advocate for ourselves
physio that’s offered, follow medical when we’re receiving health care
instructions, get the best sleep you because we’re vulnerable. The natural
can and focus on all the stuff you reaction is to be as small a burden as
love about your life outside the possible. Sticking up for ourselves can
hospital. Use your stay to get well, make us feel worried that we’re priori-
not sicker! tizing our needs over those of others.

ALLY JAYE REEVES MEGAN MURPHY

(Illustrator, “Ramadan (Writer, “Me, My Mom
Revisited,” page 56) and Sears,” page 40)

Home base: Home base:

Toronto. Previously Peterborough, Ont.
published in The Globe and Mail and Previously published in Women
Quill & Quire. With this illustration, With Vision and Our Canada. Stories
I wanted to reflect the themes of faith, have the power to connect and to
community and support described in heal. I’ve gone through a lot of loss,
the article. I’m looking to capture folks and sharing my experience has
coming together, and the connection allowed me to move forward. We
between this coalescence and food. often think that showing our wounds
My artistic style is characterized by makes us defenceless, but it’s empow-
bright colours and the use of form and ering. My stories may be personal, but
texture. It’s playful, energetic and fun! the underlying themes are universal.

6 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 Letters
READERS COMMENT ON OUR RECENT ISSUES

READING WITH GRANDMA

Growing up in the 1980s and
’90s, some of my earliest, fondest
memories are of stretching out
on a lawn chair perusing Read-
er’s Digest with my grandmother.
For hours, we’d share jokes and
articles and enjoy the magazine
together. I taught myself to read
by sifting through decades’
worth of issues lying around
my grandmother’s house. I was
always amazed that the stories
were about real people, even real
kids. I felt like I knew them. As
an only child in a pre-Internet
era, that connection meant a lot
to me. LAURA MOORE, Ottawa

PASSING IT ON I saw a copy at my dentist’s office. Now

I used to read Reader’s Digest during I’m sharing the love: I read the arti-
my childhood in India. I can still pic- cles with my university-aged daugh-
ture the postman delivering it to our ter and the “Word Power” and “Trivia
house. It always sat on top of the Quiz” sections with my teenage son.
magazine pile in the living room. I Holding Reader's Digest today gives
rediscovered Reader’s Digest five me the same joy I felt as a kid.
years after moving to Toronto when KIRAN WADEHRA, To r o n t o

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 7
READER’S DIGEST

I demanded she be taken off pain-

killers unless she asked for them.
When she was transferred to a rehab
centre, they assessed her condition
as palliative, which I fought tooth
and nail. Today, she’s nearly 97 and
seems sharper mentally than she
was before her fall. Advocating for
adequate care for loved ones is a
constant battle.
COLLEEN CHUPKA, S t . A l b e r t , A l t a .

WORD FAMILY
It would be great to see the “Word
Play” article in the December issue
become a regular feature. Language
has been my passion since learning
to read on my own at age five. I get it
from my mother: one of her most
treasured possessions was an old
IMPROPER TREATMENT dictionary that showed the origins
I have seen first-hand the kind of and evolution of words. I have tried
hospital-induced delirium described to pass this enthusiasm on to my
in “State of Confusion” (March 2017). children, some of whom do share it.
My 94-year-old mother wound up For us, reading is a way to under-
in hospital after a bad fall on Boxing stand other cultures and other times.
Day 2015. She was administered a SARAH SILVER, To r o n t o
high dose of painkillers, and within
hours she was hallucinating and tell- Published letters are edited for length
ing frightening, disjointed stories. and clarity.

WRITE We want to hear from you! Have something to say about an article you read in Reader’s
TO US! Digest? Send your letters to [email protected]. Please include your full name and address.
Contribute Send us your funny jokes and anecdotes, and if we publish one in a print
KATIE CAREY

edition of Reader’s Digest, we’ll send you $50. To submit, visit rd.ca/joke.
Original contributions (text and photos) become the property of The Reader’s Digest
Magazines Canada Limited, and its affiliates, upon publication. Submissions may be
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Receipt of your submission cannot be acknowledged.
 FINISH THIS SENTENCE

The one food I will

never get tired of is…
…Old Dutch
potato chips—
pretty much any flavour!
…broccoli! KATHY HORTON,
MANNVILLE, ALTA.
I’ve even got my three-
year-old grandson
addicted to it.
CHERYL MACMILLAN …just about any kind of seafood.
ASHTON, SIMCOE, ONT. EDITH DESROCHE, TIGNISH, P.E.I.

…grilled cheese
…chocolate,
but it has to be the
and tomato soup. good dark stuff!
DELORES GABRIEL, PATRICIA ANNE VEINOT,
STEPHENVILLE, N.L. NEW GERMANY, N.S.

…eggs.
You can scramble them, make an omelette, bake with them—they’re very versatile!
DEB PFEIFFER, LONDON, ONT.

 Visit the Reader’s Digest Canada Facebook page for your chance to finish the next sentence.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 9
 ART of LIVING

Retired trucker Margaret Foster Hyde pairs long-haul

drivers with dogs in need of a ride

Giving Lifts
BY KATH E RINE LAID LAW
PHOTOGRAPH BY AARON TATOR

! WHEN CHRISTA PARE’S father,

Jim, died of cancer in November 2017,
A relative who had heard of Pare’s
dilemma directed her to the Facebook
finding a home for Tundra became page of Furry Hobos N Hiway Heroes,
a priority. The five-year-old dog, hoping the group might help. The
a husky-Lab mix with boundless four-year-old organization is the
enthusiasm and a thick coat of white brainchild of Margaret Foster Hyde,
fur speckled with auburn, had been a retired trucker who dreamed up
Jim’s constant companion. Pare had the plan of pairing dogs with long-
arranged for two of Jim’s good friends distance truck drivers when she real-
to adopt the dog, but there was a snag: ized how expensive it would be to get
the couple lived in Thunder Bay, a her newly adopted English springer
13-hour drive from the Pare home in spaniel, Barkley, from Sudbury to
Renfrew, Ont., 95 kilometres outside of Thunder Bay. Back then, Foster Hyde
Ottawa. It would cost more than $800 called up a friend who worked the
to fly Tundra north, and Pare, a radio route and asked if Barkley could hitch
host, was already logging extra time a ride. “The idea just blossomed and
in the booth to pay for funeral costs. caught on,” says the 66-year-old.
“Tundra’s future was weighing heavily When Pare heard back from Foster
on my shoulders,” she says now. Hyde, she was so relieved that she

10 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 Pickles, a 12-year-old
German pinscher, was
one of the first dogs to
be transported by Furry
Hobos N Hiway Heroes.
Founder Margaret Foster
Hyde adopted him
following a breakup
between his owners.
READER’S DIGEST

cried. “Beyond the cost, to have to At first, she enlisted drivers she
crate Tundra and put him on a plane knew, but after a while, new recruits
by himself after he lost his best friend came her way via word of mouth. She
would have been awful,” she says. currently partners with more than
“He loves being in a vehicle—this 20 truckers, a number of whom have
was a perfect solution.” ended up adopting their shelter-
At her home outside Thunder Bay, bound cargo themselves.
Foster Hyde has three whiteboards The Hiway Heroes never charge
set up in the living room. One tracks a shipping fee, asking only for baked
the drivers’ routes, one is for the dogs goods and Tim Hortons coffee in
who need rides and one is for the return. (They have received every-
dogs already in transit. Since her thing from homemade Oreo cookies
group’s inception, to cheese platters
Foster Hyde estimates to loaves of bread.)
they’ve transported
between 300 and 400
The Hiway Heroes The supplies drivers
need—leashes, blan-
dogs across Canada never charge a kets, dog food—are
and the United States. shipping fee, paid for by Foster Hyde
“We used to move lit- asking only for or donated. Over the
ters of puppies, but we years, the group has
try to avoid that now
baked goods escorted a stolen pit
because it can get hard and Tim Hortons bull back to its owner
in the trucks,” she says. coffee in return. and ferried a pair of St.
“Too much poo.” Bernards from the east
Requests come in coast to Calgary. The
from private owners, veterinarians, longest distance a pup has travelled
rescue organizations and shelters. is the 2,315 kilometres between Los
Once Foster Hyde has identified Angeles and Lethbridge, Alta.
her charge and where it needs to go, As for Tundra’s comparatively
she sketches out a route with as few short-haul trip from Renfrew, it was
hand-offs as possible. Then she’ll made possible by a driver named
get on the phone with the drivers. Greg Rumbolt, who dropped the
It’s not unusual for a group of husky off at the Pass Lake truck stop
truckers to hold a conference call in near Thunder Bay this past January.
the middle of the night and spend The instant Rumbolt opened the
hours joking around once they’ve cab’s door, Tundra leaped out onto
made logistical arrangements. “It the snow to meet his new owners.
feels like a family,” says Foster Hyde. He was home.

12 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 Life’s Like That
LAST YEAR’S BRONZE MEDALLIST SEEING DOUBLE
I was at Canadian Tire, chatting with
the young woman at the till.
“You’ve been here a while, haven’t
you?” I asked.
“No,” she said. “That’s my twin sis-
ter. She’s been here six months. I
started a couple of weeks ago.”
“Really?” I said. “Well, if they liked
having one of you, they must be even
happier now.”
11points.com “Actually,” she replied, “the man-
ager was telling my sister that she
ALTHOUGH SHE CELEBRATED her
was such a good worker that he
100th birthday this past summer, my
wished he could clone her. So she
grandma is young at heart. She
brought me in the next day, took me
recently moved from her beloved
to the manager and said, ‘Okay, here
home of 60 years into an assisted-
you go!’”
living facility where she has her own
ANDY FIELDING, S e c h e l t , B . C .
apartment. During my first visit, I
asked her, “So, Grandma, what do
LET’S GET CRACKIN’
you think of your new place?” She
You know you’re getting older when
replied, with some trepidation, “Oh,
your back goes out more than you do.
it’s nice, but there are a lot of old
MICHAEL TITCHNER, S u r r e y , B . C .
people here.”
ALANA CHRAPKO, S h e r w o o d Pa r k , A l t a .
CHANGE IS INEVITABLE, except
from a vending machine.
FORTUNE ROOKIE
ROBERT GALLAGHER, w r i t e r
I’m going to retire and live off my life
savings. What I’ll do the second Send us your funny stories! They could
week, I have no idea. be worth $50. See page 8 or visit
@INIKS rd.ca/joke for more details.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 13
CULTURE

Our top picks in books and movies

RD Recommends
BY DAN I E L L E G RO E N

1
BOYS
Rachel Giese
Four waves of feminism have helped
sweep away some tired assumptions about
femaleness, but when it comes to challenging
stereotypes of masculinity—toughness, good; gentleness,
bad—we haven’t been nearly as thorough. Toronto journalist
Rachel Giese, herself the mother of a teenage son, brings a fierce intellect and
deep compassion to this long overdue conversation. And she’s enlisted some
backup: a series of parents, teachers, coaches, scientists and unforgettable kids
work to unpack and reimagine the meaning of boyhood—and manhood. May 1.

DID YOU KNOW? Millennial men report feeling pushed to behave in conven-
tionally masculine ways. According to a 2017 Pew Center study, nearly
70 per cent believe there is pressure to throw a punch if provoked, and
61 per cent say there’s an expectation to have numerous sexual partners.

2 A HIGHER LOYALTY
James Comey
(GIESE) HARP ER COLLINS

The title of this memoir can certainly be read as a veiled dig

at Trump, who demanded the erstwhile FBI director’s loyalty,
then fired him months later. But James Comey has ample dirt
to share on many big names: this is the man who prosecuted
mobster John Gambino and insider trader Martha Stewart
and can pull back the curtain on domestic surveillance, Rus-
sian meddling and Hillary Clinton’s damn emails. April 17.

14 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 3 BOOK CLUB
Bring Jane Fonda, Diane Keaton, Can-
dice Bergen and Mary Steenburgen together in
4
DISOBEDIENCE
one movie, and an audience would happily pay Chilean director Sebas-
to watch them read the phone book. But this tián Lelio (whose work
comedy has something spicier in mind: the four includes A Fantastic
women, luminous as ever, play long-standing Woman, the 2018 Oscar
friends whose lives change in unexpected ways winner for best foreign-
after their monthly book club reads Fifty Shades language film) makes
of Grey. May 18. his English-language
debut in this simmering
drama about forbidden
love in a tight-knit
Orthodox Jewish com-
munity in North Lon-
don. Rachel Weisz
and Rachel McAdams
deliver controlled, cap-
tivating performances
as estranged childhood
friends—one now secu-
lar, one still devout—
(BO OK CLUB ) MELIN DA SUE GORDON /PA RAM OUN T PIC TURES

whose mutual passion

refuses to be extin-
guished. April 27.

5 THE NEVER-ENDING PRESENT

Michael Barclay
To compile this intimate biography of the Tragi-
cally Hip, veteran music journalist Michael Barclay
spoke with dozens of the band’s friends, associates
and admirers. It all culminates with that final
heart-stopping show in the summer of 2016,
when a country came together in living rooms and
neighbourhood parks across Canada to join dying
frontman Gord Downie in one last set list of our
national anthems. April 3.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 15
THE RD INTERVIEW

Come From Away creators Irene Sankoff and David

Hein on their hit musical, telling an iconic story of
hope and becoming honorary Newfoundlanders

Strongest
Together
BY COUR T N E Y S H E A
ILLUSTRATION BY AIMÉE VAN DRIMMELEN

Come From Away has returned to

Canada after a successful Broad-
way run that garnered seven Tony
Award nominations. Are you still
pinching yourselves?
Hein: Every step along the way has
been a pinching-ourselves moment.
We were never focused on writing
a Broadway show. We always just
wanted to share an incredible story
about these amazing people.

The musical is about the 38 air-

planes forced to land in Gander,
N.L., on September 11, 2001—and
the town’s touching hospitality for
all those travellers. How did you

16 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
first become involved in writing
that story?
Sankoff: We had closed our previous
show, My Mother’s Lesbian Jewish
Wiccan Wedding, and were having
trouble finding our next project.
Toronto theatre producer Michael
Rubinoff asked to meet us. He shared
the idea for Come From Away.
Hein: From there we were fortunate
enough to get a Canada Council for
the Arts grant, which funded our
trip to Gander on the 10th anniver-
sary of 9/11. All of these people who
had been stranded there a decade
ago—passengers and flight crew
from around the world—came back
to commemorate what had hap-
pened. Gander is a hard place to get
to, but they all wanted to be there.

Did the idea of writing a 9/11

musical feel daunting?
Sankoff: I don’t think it felt that way.
The story of what happened in
Gander was immediately familiar
to us. On Sept. 11, 2001, we were
living in New York in a residence
with students from 110 different
countries. By the end of that day,
someone pulled out a piano and
started playing, and we all gravi-
tated to the music.
Hein: What I remember from that
time in New York is that you could
walk up to any person in the street
and say, “Are you okay?” And that’s
what we saw 10 years later when we

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 17
READER’S DIGEST

went to Gander. Strangers invited us what we wanted to do with Come

to stay in their homes. From Away—create a kitchen party
for our audience every night.
Did you worry about accurately
representing the wide range of What is it like to be a husband-and-
their experiences? wife writing team?
Hein: Yes. We joke that we had Hein: People always say they can’t
16,000 stories to tell because there imagine working with their spouse,
were 7,000 people on the planes and and it’s not for the faint of heart.
9,000 residents in Gander. While we When Irene has a plan A and I have
couldn’t include everything, we a plan B, we have to work our way
wanted the real people to come to through that, but coming up with
the show and feel like we got their a plan C together is our strength.
story right. Sankoff: We have rules about trying
One of the things that happened not to work on the show when we’re
in real life is that the air traffic con- hungry or angry or in bed. It’s incred-
trol crews didn’t have anything to ibly not-sexy when the show gets
do after the planes landed so they brought up in bed. Also, over the
spent days making chili. Originally, years, we’ve learned that it’s better
we had three scenes in the show for us to work in public because
about chili. In the end, it was just there are witnesses.
one line, but it’s in there.
The positive reactions we have got- You wrote Come From Away long
ten from the real people who inspired before the current political land-
the show have been so rewarding. scape came to be. How does it feel
to be at the helm of a musical about
Do you now have a favourite inclusiveness and tolerance during
Newfoundland tradition? the Trump era?
Sankoff: Mine is more of an idea. Hein: It’s been healing. With the
It’s a line from Les Misérables— things you see in the news and on
“What we have, we have to share.” social media, it’s been good for
If someone shows up at the door, us—and everyone else, I hope—to
you help them. celebrate human kindness and to
Hein: I love the kitchen parties, the tell a story about people coming
whole concept of getting through together despite their differences.
the winter by bringing over instru-
ments and singing and dancing Come From Away is on stage now at
together as a community. That’s Toronto’s Royal Alexandra Theatre.

18 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
RE ADER’S DIGEST IN PARTNERSHIP WITH GUARDIAN ® AND I.D.A.® PHARMACIES

Pharmacists Answering Your Health Questions

A Dose of Advice
A Dose of Advice is a regular Q&A series that features
trusted Guardian® and I.D.A.® pharmacists from
communities all across Canada. This edition features
Jaclyn Makowichuk, pharmacist at Sandstone I.D.A.®
Pharmacy in Calgary, Alberta.

have a variety of tools effective at monitoring

depression. Rest assured that these consultations
According to the Canadian are private, so you can feel comfortable talking to
us about your personal situation.
Mental Health Association,
1 in 5 Canadians will I’ve been struggling with what seems to be
experience a mental health anxiety without a cause. What can I do to
problem or illness in their cope?
lifetime. Anxiety is a common response to
certain situations, such as taking a
test. In regular cases, anxiety is linked
WRDVSHFLʳFHYHQWDQGJRHVDZD\ZKHQWKDWHYHQW
My dad suffered from depression for most is over. But when the worrying persists over time,
of his life, and I’m worried I might too. How or if you’re stressed for no apparent reason, you
can I tell if it’s depression or if I’m just feeling may be dealing with a general anxiety disorder.
down? Here are some of the most common physical
While it’s true that people with a family symptoms experienced by individuals with
history of depression are more likely to anxiety: a racing heartbeat, dizziness, a choking
suffer from the illness, depression is a feeling. Psychological symptoms include
combination of biochemical, environmental and FRQVWDQW ZRUU\LQJ DQG GLIʳFXOW\ FRQFHQWUDWLQJ
genetic factors, so just because your dad suffered Anxiety is usually exacerbated by certain triggers.
from the illness, doesn’t mean you will too. Once you know what the root of the problem is,
If you experience a noticeable change in mood, then managing the condition will become easier.
if you’ve lost interest in activities you used to Managing anxiety usually involves a combination
enjoy, or if feeling down has affected your daily of medication and counselling. There are also
activities for an extended period of time, speak to lifestyle changes that can help you cope.
your doctor. Depression can be overcome, with the Make sure you’re getting regular exercise. Aim
proper diagnosis and treatment. for aerobic activity at least three times a week.
Pharmacists can help in several ways. Your local Getting enough sleep is crucial, as is learning
Guardian® or I.D.A.® pharmacist can answer any to relax and control your breathing. Try to avoid
medication-related questions or concerns you alcohol and caffeinated beverages, as well as
might have. We can help explain the side effects stimulants, such as other medications (speak to
of your treatment regimen, for example. We also your local pharmacist for more information.)

Get a dose of our pharmacists’ advice

at guardian-ida-pharmacies.ca
 Points to Ponder
BY C H RISTINA PALASS IO

PHOTO: (DHAVERNAS) AN DI A/ALA MY STOCK P HOTO. QUOTES: (SEGA L) OTTAWA CITIZ EN (JULY 14, 2017); (KLASSEN) CBC’S
There is a lack of food that’s good for I’m hoping that when I retire I can

PLAYER’ S OWN VOICE (JAN. 12, 2018); (DHAVERNAS) DEC. 4, 2017; (M C LACHLIN) DEC. 16, 2017; (CYR) DEC. 1, 2017.
you, that makes you feel good and continue in some way to push this
also tastes good. Eating well project of access to justice and mak-
shouldn’t be like taking medicine. ing justice more accessible to all
women, men and children in Canada.
B u s i n e s s m a n DAVID SEGAL on why he
launched his new fresh fast food venture, Mad Radish Fo r m e r C h i e f Ju s t i c e
BEVERLEY MCLACHLIN, in The Globe and Mail

I had the athletic ability to play dif-

ferent sports, but channelling that People think that the underwater
ability into excelling at speed skating world is silent. But it’s the opposite.
was the challenge I wanted to find an You hear four times more under-
answer to, and I was prepared to water than on land. Sound travels
work at it with all my heart. four times as fast.

O l y m p i c s p e e d -s k a t e r CINDY O c e a n c i n e m a t o g ra p h e r
KLASSEN, looking back on her start in the sport MARIO CYR, on Radio-Canada

A couple of years
ago I was part of a
jury for a film festival,
and the president of
the jury slapped my
ass in front of the
whole committee.
A c t r e s s CAROLINE DHAVERNAS, discussing
sexual violence in the film industry, in The Kit

20 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 I think one of
PHOTO: (EL-AKKAD) MICHAEL LIONSTAR. QUOTES: (EL-AKKAD) APRIL 2, 2017; (OFF) NOV. 17, 2017; (BISSON) NOV. 30, 2017; (CHOUINARD)

the things that’s

been lost in this
incredibly polarized
world we live in is the
idea that it’s possible
to understand
without taking
somebody’s side.
OMAR EL-AKKAD, a u t h o r o f t h e n o v e l
FOR BES (DEC. 5, 2017); (FISCHMAN) NOV. 21, 2017; (ROGEN) VA NI T Y FAIR (JULY 14, 2017).

A m e r i c a n Wa r , on NPR

Have I ever been scared? You know, I’m going to sue him. It seems the
often. I’m scared right now...and I’m only thing this administration under-
being interviewed. You’re making me stands is lawsuits.
very nervous. I don’t know where
we’re going with this conversation. Pa t a g o n i a C E O YVON CHOUINARD,
You could ask me anything and I’d after the Trump administration reduced the size of Bear
Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments
have to answer.

A s It Ha p p e n s c o - h o s t CAROL OFF, Translators have to be chameleons.

responding to an interview question from nine-year-old It’s our professional obligation. Over
student-journalist Ivy Brooks
the weekend, I was Larry Tremblay.
Last week, I was Anne Hébert.
I used to stage murder scenes for my
mom to come home to. I could never Aw a rd -w i n n i n g t ra n s l a t o r SHEILA
fool her. She would just laugh so FISCHMAN, in The Walrus

much she’d start crying and would

drive me crazy. Me dead, with blood Impending doom that was ultim-
everywhere, and she never bought it. ately avoidable.

A c t o r YANNICK BISSON, A c t o r SETH ROGEN, on what he

in Zoomer considers the lowest depth of misery

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 21
HOME

New at the gardening

game? Held back by
memories of failed
veggie patches past?
Author and organic
gardening teacher
Emily Murphy weighs
in on what you’ll need
to turn your black
thumb green.

Planting
the Seed
FROM GROW WHAT YOU LOVE

Planning Your Garden Find the right spot. If you have

Try to recycle. If you have a con- a flood of light coming in through
tainer that holds soil and allows for south-facing windows, or an entry-
drainage, you’ve got yourself a gar- way with plenty of sun and room for
den. A mint tin, an old washtub, a both a path and plants, you’re in
ISTOC KPHOTO

basket, a trash can or a wine box can business. Setting up an indoor space
all be transformed into homes for with supplemental light is also an
plants—just add drain holes to the option. Rooftops, decks and bal-
sides and bottom and fill it with soil. conies are great places to begin, too.

22 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
Use walls, fences and hanging gar-
dens to optimize finite space. If your
home has limited access to the out-
doors, your best bet may be to find a
community garden or share the yard
of a neighbour.

Keep the plants close. Place

the garden where you can see it from
a window, in a spot you pass by on a
Is Your Soil
daily basis or in a place you like to be. Healthy?
This immediately shifts the garden In between the soil particles—
experience from burden to lifestyle. which are really just varying
Time spent tending to your garden— amounts of grit, rock dust, min-
a few minutes here and there— erals and broken-down organic
matter like leaves, twigs and
becomes part of your every day. poop—is life. Soil should be
teeming with microbes, fungi,
Where to Begin worms and critters of all kinds.
Start small. Raised beds, troughs Plants require an assortment
and potted stairway gardens help of macro- and micronutrients
to successfully carry out the
focus your attention and manage
work of growing from seed
your time. At this scale, you can eas- to fruit. Nitrogen (N), phos-
ily see where to weed and what needs phorus (P) and potassium (K)
to be watered. are the heavy hitters. When
you see “NPK” on a bag of soil
Grow what you love. Find the or a box of fertilizer, these are
the key elements, although
things that make you happy—plants equally important are calcium,
you enjoy cooking with or simply magnesium, sulphur, oxygen
looking at. Make sure they work in and carbon.
your climate. To understand what you’re
working with, dig in. What
happens when you squeeze a
Set yourself up for success.
handful of soil and then let it
Many plants need shelter from wind go? If it’s in good shape, it will
and animals. Take notice of who might hold together for a moment
be out to eat your garden before you and then gently come apart
do, and pinpoint your sunniest loca- and look light and fluffy in the
palm of your hand.
tions. Most veggie gardens require full
sun (six to eight hours of direct light).

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 23
READER’S DIGEST

Get watering right. Soil-level and garden beds have adequate

watering helps prevent disease and drainage. Tend your soil, adding
conserve water. A well-planned drip organic matter to make a healthy
or soaker hose system with an irrig- home for beneficial soil microbes
ation timer takes the worry out of and decomposers. And plant in
gardening and reduces your time polycultures—meaning, grow mul-
commitment. There are simple set- tiple crops in the same place. Divers-
ups that connect to a spigot and can ity will minimize problems with
be run along patios, and more elab- pests and attract pollinators.
orate systems for larger gardens.
Nanny pots are perfect for small If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
containers that would otherwise When a plant looks happy, it prob-
be watered by hand. If you’re away ably is, and further watering or fertil-
for a long weekend or simply want izing won’t make it happier. In fact,
to guarantee your plants are getting the opposite may occur.
the water they need, fill a bottle with
water, flip it over and push the open Let go of perfect. Expect one-
end into the soil. The soil will seal the hit wonders, consistent winners and
opening, and water will flow from losing battles. Don’t wait for every-
the bottle as the soil dries out. thing to be just so to start planting—
embrace the fact that gardens are the
Copy nature. In the wild, water definition of change. Some plants
runs downhill. So too should water thrive while others die; you and your
in your garden. Make sure planters garden will evolve together.

@2018, EMILY MURPHY. FROM GROW WHAT YOU LOVE, PUBLISHED BY FIREFLY BOOKS, FIREFLYBOOK.COM

SCARED SILLY

I live in fear that one day the real “World’s Greatest Dad”
is going to show up to reclaim his rightful mug.
@MARCMACK

Honestly, my biggest fear about becoming

a zombie is all the walking.
@GASHLEYMADISON

24 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 HEALTH

How to avoid shoe-

related problems

Foot Pain
Explained
BY SAM ANTH A R I DEOU T

! OUR FEET ARE the structural

foundation of our body, supporting
occasions and opt for a wider heel or
a wedge rather than a stiletto.
not only our weight but also our Meanwhile, shoes with pointy toe
well-being. Even seemingly minor boxes or tips that crowd your feet can
foot ailments, if denied the chance force your toes to curl up instead of
to heal, can cause ongoing impair- lie flat. This can lead to hammertoe,
ment, leading to an inactive lifestyle a bending deformity in one or more
(and its associated risks), as well as of your smaller toes that makes
falls or injuries. movement painful or difficult.
Yet studies suggest that at least half Summer brings another liability:
of us undermine these anchors of our over-reliance on flip-flops or flimsy
health with ill-fitting footwear. Overly sandals. While these shoes do protect
tight or narrow shoes, which are most your feet from hot sand at the beach
DEJA N DUN DJERS KI/ISTOCKP HOTO

likely to be worn by women, can or from infections at the pool, they’re

cause callouses and bunions, bony not suitable for daylong wear. They
bumps at the base of the big toe that provide no stability to your ankles,
are often accompanied by swelling thus raising your chances of sprains.
and soreness. Another staple feature And they offer little support for your
of women’s fashion, high heels, are arches, which puts you at risk of plan-
associated with corns, blisters and tar fasciitis: painful inflammation of
ingrown toenails. If you like their the band of tissue that extends from
style, consider saving them for special your heels to your toes.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 25
 People with diabetes should be should be wide, have a toe box with
particularly conscious of their foot- enough space for the toes, be made
wear choices. Sufferers are more of a breathable material, such as
likely to have poor leather or canvas, and
circulation to their ideally have a heel
extremities, which Nearly no higher than 2.5
makes healing slow centimetres,” says
and tricky. They’re
also susceptible to
nerve damage that
can prevent them
80%
of people aged 75 and
older have foot problems,
Emma McConnachie,
who works with the
College of Podiatry
in London, U.K.
from feeling any pain “Shoes with laces
and poor footwear is one
before a foot problem of the main causes. that come up over
grows serious. the middle of the foot
What do foot- will provide the best
friendly shoes look and feel like? kind of support.” If you’re unsure of
They’re comfortable, with no pres- how to address your specific needs,
sure on the joints, pinching on the most podiatrists offer footwear con-
sides or slippage at the heel. “They sultations—a good first step.

TEST YOUR MEDICAL IQ

Radiofrequency ablation is…

A. a constellation of symptoms C. monitoring patients remotely
resulting from nuclear radiation. via computer.
B. sensitivity to noise. D. a treatment that uses radio
waves to heat tissues.

Answer: D. Radiofrequency ablation is a non-surgical treatment for back

pain, neck pain or chronic arthritis. Delivered by a needle, a radiofrequency
current heats nerve tissues, interrupting the pain signals they were sending
to the brain. The nerve will likely regenerate in time, but pain relief may last
up to 12 months. It’s considered a low-risk treatment, though it can occa-
sionally result in infection or bleeding at the treated site.

26 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 NEWS FROM THE

World of Medicine
BY SAM ANTH A RID EO UT

Vision Loss Associated dangerous. If you’re struggling, don’t

With Cognitive Decline let the desire to present a flawless
A Stanford University study of more facade to the world prevent you from
than 30,000 seniors aged 60 and seeking assistance. A psychologist
older connected visual impairment could help you overcome perfection-
with poorer cognitive function. While ism and the chronic stress it entails.
correlation doesn’t prove causation, it
makes sense that less visual stimula- Hot Flashes May
tion could lead to less engagement Signal Diabetes Risk
with the world and, ultimately, a more Traditionally viewed as a mere incon-
sluggish mind. Health authorities rec- venience, hot flashes—especially fre-
ommend that elderly people get eye quent and severe ones—have been
exams every one to two years to pin- connected in recent years with vascu-
point treatable problems, regardless of lar factors that increase the risk of
whether they are having sight issues. It heart disease. Now, research pub-
may reduce the likelihood of dementia lished in Menopause suggests they
and definitely improves quality of life. also reflect a heightened diabetes
risk. One-third of the 150,007 partici-
Perfectionism pating post-menopausal women
Can Be Deadly reported having experienced hot
Perfectionism brings with it a greater flashes or night sweats, and this
risk of suicidal thoughts and group was 18 per cent more
attempts, according to a likely to develop diabetes.
meta-analysis from several Menopause is a great time
Canadian universities. to adopt a heart-friendly
Both an internal drive to diet, stop smoking, exer-
achieve an ideal and cise regularly and avoid
CLAI RE BENOI ST

perceived pressure from excess alcohol. These

outside sources—family, changes will diminish
bosses, social norms—were hot flashes and improve
shown to be potentially longer-term health.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 27
HEALTH

What’s Wrong
With Me?
BY SYDN E Y LO N E Y
ILLUSTRATION BY VICTOR WONG

THE PATIENT: Claire, a 17-year-old high Doctors suspected Claire had E. coli
school student from Kingston, Ont. (she had eaten hamburgers and raw
THE SYMPTOMS: Abdominal cramps cookie dough shortly before her
and diarrhea symptoms appeared, and either
THE DOCTOR: Dr. Jocelyn Garland, could have been the culprit). When
a nephrologist at Kingston a standard test failed to confirm the
General Hospital diagnosis, doctors sent stool cultures
to the Hospital for Sick Children in
! IN AUGUST 2016, Claire had
just returned from a family holiday
Toronto for more in-depth testing.
The results came back positive for
in Europe and was looking forward a form of the bacteria.
to a few more weeks of summer vaca- E. coli infections usually resolve on
tion. But shortly after she got home, their own, and after two days, Claire’s
she experienced severe abdominal diarrhea improved. However, other
cramps and diarrhea that kept her symptoms emerged: her abdomen
conined to the house. Over the next swelled; she had abdominal cramp-
ive days, the pain intensiied. When ing; and she began vomiting.
signs of rectal bleeding appeared, An ultrasound revealed that Claire
her parents took her to the ER at was retaining fluid in her abdomen.
Kingston General Hospital. She also had blood and protein in her
Infectious disease specialists and urine, a sign her kidneys were failing.
gastroenterologists examined Claire When severe hypertension set in,
and discovered that the wall of her she was transferred to the ICU. With
colon was swollen and bleeding. most E. coli infections, supportive

28 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
treatment, such as keeping patients “Her parents said to me, ‘We think
hydrated, is all that’s necessary, says she’s dying,’” Garland recalls. “I told
Dr. Jocelyn Garland, who was called in them, ‘Well, I’m pretty stubborn.’” Gar-
to consult on the case. “You treat vari- land discovered that an off-label medi-
ous organs as they become affected cation used to treat another rare blood
and wait for the bacteria to run its disorder had been used to successfully
course. But Claire wasn’t responding resolve aHUS by shutting down the
to treatment—she was critically ill.” complement system. After consulting
E. coli is relatively benign, causing with other specialists and sending
mild indigestion, but on rare occasions Claire’s blood to an overseas lab that
it can spark a reaction that produces confirmed her complement system’s
a life-threatening toxin. activity level, she
“It attacks the lining of decided to try it.
the blood vessels and After the first dose,
leads to severe, multi-
After the first Claire’s organs were
organ dysfunction,” dose, Claire’s still failing. She went
Garland says. organs were still blind and then began
Doctors tried plasma having seizures. “It was
therapy to replace the failing. She went a disaster,” Garland
infected blood, but after blind and began says. She tested Claire’s
five days, Claire was still blood and found no sign
in constant pain. Nine having seizures. of the drug, suggesting
days after her symp- she hadn’t been given
toms first appeared, her enough. Garland dou-
kidneys failed. Blood tests showed bled the dose. “All of a sudden—
that her complement system—a whammo—she responded.”
defence mechanism that kills bac- Claire stopped having seizures,
teria—was active. At the same time, and her sight returned within a week.
her red blood cells and platelets were She recovered in the hospital for two
being destroyed, and she developed months and was slowly weaned off the
organ damage. After some research, drug. Now, although doctors see her
Garland became convinced that Claire every six months to check that her
had atypical hemolytic uremic syn- organs are functioning properly, Claire
drome (aHUS), a disease caused by has almost completely recovered and
uncontrolled activation of the comple- recently graduated from high school.
ment system. “It’s a one-in-a-million Her off-label treatment was controver-
condition,” she says. And in up to sial, but it saved her life, Garland says.
40 per cent of cases, it can be deadly. “Her recovery really was a miracle.”

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 29
COVER STORY

Secrets
Hospitals
Don’t Tell You
What patients need to know for
their own well-being

BY LISA BENDALL
PHOTOGRAPHS BY DANIEL EHRENWORTH

30 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 Pick the Right Place
“A teaching hospital, where a
1. comprehensive ‘no stones left
unturned’ workup can be done, is
better for complex issues, gravely ill
patients or when no one can figure
out what is going on,” says Dr. Jeffrey
Brock of MedExtra, a private Montreal-
based firm that helps patients navigate
the public health care system.
Hospital stays often
come as a surprise, Wait times in Canadian emer-
but that doesn’t mean
2. gency departments have been
increasing, primarily because of hos-
you can’t be prepared. pital overcrowding, according to the
The following insights, Canadian Institute for Health Informa-
which are based on tion (CIHI). If your injury isn’t critical
or complicated, consider choosing an
current research and ER with a fast-track clinic or rapid
expert advice, might assessment zone.
not have occurred to
you—or been brought The length of your wait in the
up by your health care 3. ER can depend less on staff and
more on factors you might not have
team. These 50 points thought of, including the physical lay-
can go a long way out of the department, how its sup-
towards preventing plies are stored and the efficiency of
other departments such as radiology.
unwelcome incidents,
reducing the likelihood Not all ERs are able to be open
of complications, 4. 24 hours. In some regions, they’ve
and speeding up your been forced to close at night or over
weekends. “There are emergency
recovery, ensuring
ISTOCKP HOTO

departments struggling to cover staff

an improved overall during certain hours,” says Dr. Paul
hospital experience. Pageau, president of the Canadian
Association of Emergency Physicians.

32 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 Bigger isn’t always better. In a
5. 2013 CBC analysis of almost 240
acute-care hospitals in Canada, based
on information collected by the CIHI,
10 hospitals scored an A-plus. Only six
of these were large or teaching hos-
pitals. For healthy people with uncom- Pack your own pillow. “If you’re
plicated problems, a small hospital may
offer more personal care.
9. used to a certain pillow, it can
make a difference to your sleep,” Hahn-
Goldberg points out. Shut-eye is crit-
Know What to Pack ical for faster healing.

Bring your pills in their original Don’t bring valuables, credit

6. containers. “Otherwise it becomes
a guessing game, because a lot of med-
10. cards or more than just a few
dollars, as theft from hospital patients
ications look the same,” says Patrick is not uncommon.
Fitch, president of the Canadian Soci-
ety of Hospital Pharmacists. “We can Consider leaving a medical
get information from the pharmacy
label, including who fills the patient’s
11. device or accessory—a walker,
say—at home, if there will be dupli-
prescriptions. This enables us to con- cates at the hospital you can use. Yours
tact them for more information.” will take up valuable hospital-room
real estate, and might even accident-
Keep a notebook. Use it to jot ally “walk” away.
7. down your questions, the names
and specialties of health care profes- It’s probably okay to use cell
sionals who see you and what they tell
you. It may become your best tool for
12. phones in a hospital—they’re
not banned. You’d need to be within a
keeping track of your care. metre of most sensitive medical devices
for cell phone use to disrupt their func-
Ask if you can audio-record tion. But be respectful. “Privacy is a
8. discharge instructions, suggests
Shoshana Hahn-Goldberg at OpenLab,
huge issue. We’ve found family mem-
bers posting photos of patients on social
a national organization that researches media. This can pose a problem if they
ISTOC KPHOTO

improvements in health care deliv- inadvertently catch the face or informa-

ery. “It’s a stressful time and it’s very tion of a roommate in the background,”
hard for patients to retain that infor- says Dr. Alexis Goth, a hospitalist in gen-
mation later.” eral medicine at the Halifax Infirmary.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 33
READER’S DIGEST

Watch Your Wallet “Communication errors in the trans-

mission of information at handover
You may be charged big bucks are considerable,” says Goth. With a
13. for your ambulance ride,
depending on such factors as your prov-
bedside report, you’ll be able to make
clarifications and voice any concerns.
ince and the urgency of your medical
problem. “That’s often surprising for If a doctor is writing on your
people,” says Hahn-Goldberg. 18. chart, let them finish before
you speak up. “Interruption during a
Hospital parking fees can also task is a source of error,” says Goth.
14. be steep. “Parking costs are
the thing we hear about most from The World Health Organiza-
patients,” says Andrew Ignatieff, a
spokesperson for the patient-led advo-
19. tion reports that as many as a
quarter of surgical in-patients experi-
cacy group Patients Canada. Ask your ence complications. Find out if your
hospital whether it offers a discounted hospital follows a surgical safety check-
pass for frequent visitors. list, which has been linked to lower
rates of post-surgery complications.
Don’t assume your hospital
15. costs are fully covered because
you’re Canadian. You may have to shell
Ward Off Infection
out for semi-private accommodation, “Hospitals house superbugs,
crutches and other “frills.” 20. and some places are better
than others at infection control prac-
Medications in hospital are tices,” says Kim Neudorf, a member
16. free. But after you’re released,
if you don’t have drug coverage, you’ll
of Patients for Patient Safety Canada
based in Prince Albert, Sask. “Some
have to pay out of pocket. “If people patients may choose to bring in their
are worried, they should voice those own bleach wipes to clean tables,
concerns to their care team,” says Fitch. remotes, toilet handles and the like.”
“The pharmacist can see whether there
are less expensive options.” If a staff member approaches
21. you, ask if they’ve cleaned
Minimize Mistakes their hands. It’s the best way to stop
the spread of infection. According to
Ask if the nurse going off duty 2016-2017 data from Health Quality
17. can discuss your care in your
presence with the nurse coming on.
Ontario, over a third of staff in some
hospitals did not practise adequate

34 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
READER’S DIGEST

hand hygiene before coming into con- ties up our resources,” says Pageau.
tact with patients. “Patients should ask their doctor, ‘Do
I need that test? Is it something that a
Pay attention to your tubes clinical decision will be based on?’”
22. and wires. “Inform a health
care worker if an area develops redness, Those tidy-looking scrubs
or a dressing or bandage is loose,” says
Neudorf. “Don’t touch catheters.”
26. your health care provider is
wearing may not be as clean as you
think. A 2012 study in the American
Your risk of hospital-borne Journal of Infection Control showed
23. infection goes up the longer
you stay in hospital. Be just as vigilant
that home-laundered scrubs are much
more likely to contain bacteria than
about hygiene on the 14th day as you disposable scrubs or those washed by
were on the first. the hospital.

Hospital-acquired infec- You may witness violence dur-

24. tions can be picked up from
visitors, not just other patients. Play it
27. ing your stay. In an Ontario
Council of Hospital Unions survey of
safe: “If a family member doesn’t feel hospital workers, 68 per cent said they’d
well or has a cold, tell them not to visit,” been physically assaulted in the past
Neudorf cautions. year. University of Windsor adjunct
assistant professor Jim Brophy, who
Be Aware of co-authored a 2018 study on violence
the Ugly Truths against health care staff, says: “It has
enormous repercussions for the care
The CIHI has estimated that providers’ own well-being, as well as
25. more than a million unneces-
sary medical tests and treatments such
for the care they provide for patients.”

as head scans and chest X-rays are If you’ve just been diagnosed
given to Canadians annually, often sim-
ply because patients expect them. “This
28. with diabetes or have a new
colostomy, you’ll need to find a way
to pay for regular supplies like glu-
cose test strips after you get home.
Ask to speak with someone from the
ISTOC KPHOTO

social work department. Hospital social

workers are often aware of funding
sources, and can help you apply for
them before you’re released.
 More than five per cent of all “Recently, I was in the hospital, and was
29. hospital stays in Canada result
in patient harm, such as accidental
shocked to find that the rooms have no
wheelchair accessible bathrooms,” says
injury or infection, according to the Charlottetown’s Tony Dolan, past chair
Canadian Patient Safety Institute. of the Council of Canadians with Dis-
abilities. “I requested a transfer to the
A report released by the Con- rehab ward so my hospital stay would
30. ference Board of Canada
found that, compared to other OECD
be more dignified.”

countries, Canada is below average The ratio of nurses to patients

in its count of CT scanners and MRI
machines per capita.
34. isn’t mandated across Can-
ada and can vary widely, with many
more per capita in Newfoundland and
Provinces with the most peo- Labrador compared to Ontario and
31. ple living in non-rural areas
(i.e., Ontario, B.C. and Alberta) have
B.C., even though evidence shows that
appropriate staffing is linked to better
the fewest hospital beds per capita. patient safety, greater patient satisfac-
(This doesn’t necessarily indicate lon- tion and lower health costs. Research
ger wait times in these particular prov- supports a 1:4 ratio (in medicine and
inces, however.) surgery wards) as best practice.

The way your doctor is paid Recover Faster

32. could affect the care you
receive. Fee-for-service doctors (which According to the Canadian
are most of them) spend less time with
more patients and order more tests,
35. Foundation for Healthcare
Improvement, family visits during a
while doctors who are paid the same hospital stay are linked to fewer falls,
no matter how much time they spend better medication adherence and
with patients tend to provide more lower readmission rates. “Ask your
preventive care. Even if you feel rushed care team what the family-presence
by your doctor, be sure to ask all your policies are,” says Maria Judd, vice-
questions, and request that informa- president of programs.
tion be repeated if necessary.
Don’t assume the meals on

33. If you, like one in seven Cana-

dians over the age of 15, have
36. your tray are right for you.
“If you’re following a special diet, like
a disability, your hospital stay might low salt, high fibre or low potassium,
not be as accessible as you’d expect. mention it,” says Klara Lorinczi, a

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 37
READER’S DIGEST

clinical dietitian in Edmonton. “Peo- If you’re in pain, don’t wait

ple coming into hospital should be as
detailed about their diet as they are
40. for a convenient time to tell
your nurse. If you put off controlling
about the medications they take.” your discomfort, you’re more likely to
have a longer hospital stay.
If your appetite is low or
37. there’s some other reason why
you aren’t eating, tell your nurse rather 41. Research shows that seriously
ill patients have a greater risk
than skip your meals. “Usually there of complications and death if their
are changes that can be made to tailor sleep is disrupted. Ask if there’s any way
the food to the patient preferences,” to minimize noise, lights and night-
says Lorinczi. time interruptions.

You may feel like staying in Know the Risks

38. bed, but if your physician or
nurse suggests you get up, listen. The Canadian Medical Asso-
They won’t necessarily go into detail
about the consequences of inactivity,
42. ciation Journal reported in
2013 that bedbugs are being found
and they may be too busy to argue if in some Canadian hospitals. To pre-
you refuse, but that doesn’t mean vent bringing the pests home, use the
there aren’t risks. “Remaining seden- hottest wash setting for your hospital
tary contributes to blood clots, not laundry, and tumble-dry on high heat
breathing deeply enough, low mood, for 30 minutes.
loss of natural sleep-wake cycles and
increased muscle loss,” Goth says. Your hospital bed could

Patients who are taught to

43. hurt you. Health Canada has
issued notices, the most recent in 2017,
39. take charge of their own
health care—by, for instance, partici-
warning hospitals that patients have
become stuck in the spaces around the
pating in treatment decisions—have bed frame or rail. This has led to doz-
better surgical outcomes and lower ens of serious injuries, and more than
readmission rates. (A 2016 study in 40 deaths in Canada since 1980.
the Journal of the American Medical
Association found that about a quarter Though preventable, pres-
of hospital readmissions were prevent-
able; inadequate support for “patient
44. sure ulcers (a.k.a. bedsores)
are a common and painful complica-
self-management” was one of the con- tion among patients. Healing is slow
tributing factors cited.) and expensive. If you have difficulty

38 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 repositioning yourself, ask for special Speak Up
padding to help reduce pressure.
If you can, schedule an elec-

45. Medical devices aren’t tested

as vigorously as medications
47. tive surgery early in the week.
A 2013 British Medical Journal study
before they’re approved in Canada. found that elective surgeries on Mon-
According to a recent study by research- days carry the lowest risk of death.
ers in Toronto, Montreal and Alberta,
more than 7,200 medical devices have You have a right to request a
been recalled in this country since
2005, including surgical implants and
48. second opinion. Brock sug-
gests patients might exercise this choice
equipment such as infusion pumps “whenever patients or their physicians
and patient monitors. Five per cent of aren’t sure of what is going on, when
the recalled devices had problems seri- patients or their family aren’t comfort-
ous enough to put patients at extreme able, when a major patient decision is
risk. (Health Canada has a searchable required, or when there are conflicting
online database of all recalls and alerts views within the existing medical team.”
of health products.)
Ask for copies of your medical

46. Your health information

could be compromised, and
49. records—tests, lab results,
doctors’ notes and medications—
you may not even know it. Only four before you leave the hospital, since it
provinces (Ontario, New Brunswick, can be tough to get them after the fact.
Nova Scotia, and Newfoundland and Adds Brock: “If you suspect something
Labrador) have laws requiring hospi- went wrong and wasn’t disclosed, then
tals to tell patients if their medical files the daily nurses’ notes should also be
have been breached. Thousands of obtained and carefully reviewed.”
Canadians have been alerted about
breaches to date. Get in the habit of If you need to make a com-
scrutinizing all your account state-
ments (bank, credit cards, etc.) and
50. plaint, don’t wait until you’re
discharged. “It’s essential that you voice
obtain your credit report. your concern the moment the problem
occurs, to the person directly involved,
and that you engage them in a process
ISTOC KPHOTO

of resolution immediately,” says Ignati-

eff. “Informal negotiation at the bedside
is much more efficient and effective
than filing a formal complaint.”

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 39
A Sears
portrait from
the early
1980s captures
Megan Murphy
(foreground), her
older sister, Kate,
and their mother,
Mary Anne.
 FAMILY

For Megan Murphy, mourning the

end of the famed department store is
about much more than nostalgia for
sensible slacks and sales ladies with perms
READER’S DIGEST

had heard the rumours, “Never buy something unless you have

I
but I didn’t think it would the cash to pay for it.”
really happen. Yet, while My mom has been gone for five years
sipping coffee one mor- now. It’s true what they say: it gets
ning last October, I saw the easier. But when this past Christmas
headline that proved oth- neared, I still missed her terribly. So
erwise. Sears, the unsink- on one particularly cold and snowy
able department store, had December night, I drove myself to the
hit an iceberg. Sears of my youth, just to be near
Initially, I felt embarrassed that the some essence of her. Pulling open the
news made me emotional. If I’m being heavy double doors, I was instantly
honest, Sears hasn’t been a staple in my transported back to my childhood.
life for a couple of decades, so I feel a
little culpable for its permanent closing SEARS WAS MY FAMILY’S go-to store
this past January. I should’ve bought for everything, from washing machines
more appliances and comforter sets, and vacuums to perfume and clothes.
just to support it. But it’s Sears. Isn’t it I’m the second of three girls, so most
always supposed to be there? In this things I wore were hand-me-downs—
fast-paced, virtual world, it was a bricks- except in September. That’s when we’d
and-mortar constant that promised make our annual family pilgrimage
overhead fluorescent lighting, sensible to pick out a new outfit and supplies
slacks and sales ladies with perms. for the first day of school. On one of

(P REVI OUS S PREA D) P HOTO COURTESY OF MEGAN MURPH Y

Sears was, arguably, the preferred those trips, before the start of Grade 7,
store of every 1980s mother, which is I got the blue and yellow L.L. Bean
really why I miss it—because I miss backpack that saw me through elemen-
mine. My mom was a Sears mom. You tary school, high school and Europe. I
know the type: practical, strong-willed still use it today.
and understands the value of a dollar. Once there, my mom would also
She had a Sears card that she paid off shop for herself. As a part-time nurse,
with an actual cheque on the first of full-time mom and overtime extro-
every month. On those days, Mom vert, her sense of style was whole-
would pull up to the secret back lot of some but a bit fancy. I was allowed to
the store in Peterborough, Ont., by the sit on the floor of the change room
“Women’s Wear” door. She would then while she tried things on for what
tell me or one of my sisters to run in seemed like hours. My mom was
with the bill and “make sure you get it notably fond of sweaters with collars
stamped.” I felt very grown up, and already sewn into them, which she
when I got back, she’d remind me, called “cheaters.” She liked to look

42 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
presentable but only spend 10 min- I would tear the page out and carry it
utes getting ready, and these gave the with me, the original Pinterest board.
illusion that she had gone to the extra When our order finally came in, we’d
effort of layering. The best part was head to a special area upstairs, where
when she’d ask for my opinion, a the lady behind the counter would
habit she maintained as I moved into fetch it from a mysterious place called
adulthood; it never failed to boost “the back.”
my confidence. When I was 10, I had the privilege of
As for my clothes, when high-end staying up late to accompany my mom
brands not carried at Sears became to a midnight madness sale. As we
popular—such as Vuarnet and Chip & hopped into the station wagon, I was
Pepper—my mom was immune to the bleary-eyed but excited to have her all
social pressure. to myself. I got to sit next to her in the
“If all your friends jumped off a front seat, feeling more like her friend
bridge, would you jump, too?” she than her daughter.
would ask. That night the store was bustling
with Sears moms, and it was like spy-
ing on a secret society of womanhood.
My mom ran into people she knew,
ACCOMPANYING MY made small talk and joked with the
MOM TO A MIDNIGHT sales staff. I noticed how she did all
MADNESS SALE WAS this with such ease and began to see
LIKE SPYING ON her as not just my mom but as a
A SECRET SOCIETY woman. She was interesting and funny,
OF WOMANHOOD. and I was proud of her. I knew that, with
her as a role model, someday I’d have
these qualities, too.
“Yes, I would,” I’d say.
“Then at least you’ll be wearing A FEW YEARS LATER, Sears played an
something sensible when we come to integral part in my coming of age. It’s
identify your body.” where I learned the term “intimates.”
I remember blushing as I wandered
SHOPPING AT SEARS began long before through the sea of undergarments, red-
we pulled into the parking lot. When faced and terrified that someone I knew
the store’s catalogue arrived in the might spot me. But it’s not because
mail, I’d flip through it and circle things there were any provocative bras or
I wanted for Christmas—an Easy-Bake underwear there. Thongs? No way! Just
Oven or a Snoopy Sno-Cone Machine. your run-of-the-mill, full-bottomed

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 43
READER’S DIGEST

nude briefs. Sensible, utilitarian and me—but since I was well into my vot-
suitably Catholic. ing years, she reluctantly took me to
When my mom suggested buying Sears to buy a “bed in a bag”: match-
me my first training bra, I caused a ing sheets, comforter and two pillow-
scene—I wanted to deny the very exist- cases in one practical satchel. Then
ence of puberty. So we compromised she took me to church.
and she took me to Sears to get a sports
bra—after which we agreed to never WHEN I GRADUATED from university,
mention my unmentionables again. my professors were on strike. The whole
My mom was witty and feisty but event felt anticlimactic, and I didn’t
also a fan of modesty and strictness. bother to have any pictures taken. My
When my sisters and I were teen- mom was furious and marched me
agers, she enforced a “no boys on the down to the Sears portrait studio, where
second floor” rule and an 11 p.m. cur- they supplied us with a cap and gown.
few because “nothing good happens When she died a decade later, that
after midnight.” She taught us to photograph was still in her wallet.
respect ourselves and to expect the I’m scared that the shuttering of
same from others, a lesson that fil- Sears erases my mom a little bit more.
tered down to our clothing choices: Just one more time, I’d like to sit on the
“There’s no need to put it all on a silver floor of a fitting room next to a pile of
platter; leave a little something to the discarded sweater-blouses and dig
imagination.” out a scotch mint from the bottom of
My mother couldn’t make the rules a purse. Sears was more than just a
forever, though. In my third year of uni- dependable department store; it was a
versity, I decided to get my first double place to spend time with my mom,
bed. My mom disapproved—it might one where she taught me lessons on
encourage a second person to join how to be a woman.

FILM FABRICATIONS

Disney sets painfully unrealistic expectations.

No dogs will eat my spaghetti.
@ALLIEGOERTZ

Lion King plot hole: lions can’t talk.

@ MICHAELLARRICK

44 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 Laughter
THE BEST MEDICINE

JAZZ HANDS
Q: Did you hear about the bassist
THE BEST JOKE who lost both of his hands?
I EVER TOLD A: The doctors told him he’d never
BY GRAHAM CLARK walk again. @IANDOWN1996

I have a great idea for Netflix

LIGHTNING ROUND
called the relationship filter,
for when you are viewing alone ■ I once dated an apostrophe.
and want to have the feeling of Too possessive. @APARNAPKIN
watching with a loved one. It
would just be a voice that comes ■ I just found out I’m colour-blind.
on at a certain point in the film The diagnosis came completely out
to say, “Who’s that person?” then of the purple. reddit.com
a little while later, “Oh, he’s from
The West Wing.” ■ I’m very pleased with my new fridge
magnet. So far I’ve got 12 fridges.
Graham Clark is a stand-up
reddit.com
comedian and the co-host
of Stop Podcasting Yourself. FORBIDDEN FRUIT
You can find him online at
In a Catholic school cafeteria, a little
grahamclark.com or follow him
on Twitter at @grahamclark boy watches a nun place a note in
front of a pile of apples. It reads,
“Only take one. God is watching.”
Further down the line, the boy
notices a pile of cookies and makes
his own note, “Take all you want.
God is watching the apples.”
laughfactory.com

Send us your original jokes! You could

earn $50 and be featured in the magazine.
See page 8 or rd.ca/joke for details.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 45
Sergey Ananov
attempted to
circumnavigate
the globe in
his helicopter.
 DRAMA IN REAL LIFE

After crash landing in the frigid

waters of the Davis Strait,
Russian helicopter pilot
Sergey Ananov must battle
severe hypothermia, crushing fear
and one very persistent predator

STALKED BY A
POLAR
BEAR!
BY JU ST I N N O B E L
FROM P O P U L A R
MEC H A N IC S

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 47
READER’S DIGEST

THE POUNDING NOISE shatters the Ananov knows the blades could chop
silence of Davis Strait, a frigid finger off his head when he climbs out, so he
of ocean separating Canada and leans the helicopter to the left so that
Greenland. Thwick-thwack, thwick- they smash to pieces against the sea.
thwack. The noise comes from above This kills the engine and the machine
the helicopter, its pilot realizes, and starts to sink—tail first and fast.
it’s getting louder. THWICK-THWACK, Freezing water floods the cockpit,
THWICK-THWACK. rising around the pilot’s naked chest

PREVIOUS PAGES: (ANANOV) ©ALEXANDER GRONSKY; (BACKGROUND) © RALPH LEE HOPKINS/GETTY IMAGES
That pilot, Sergey Ananov, wears an and rushing down the legs of his open
old red neoprene survival suit. But the survival suit. His gear begins to float—
bulky outfit is hot and its mittens make plastic fuel tanks, a bag of clothes—
it difficult to operate the cyclic stick. but the most crucial items have been
After flying for 42 days over 33,000 suction-cupped to the windshield: two
kilometres and two continents (Eur- GPS trackers, a distress beacon and a
asia and North America), he some- satellite phone. Somewhere behind
times relaxes a little and unzips down his ankles there’s also a deflated life
to his waist. That’s why he’s bare- raft containing a survival kit with three
chested when the sound begins. flares, a half-litre of water and a tiny
The helicopter is not big: a plucky box of protein tablets.
400-kilogram Robinson R22. Ananov As Ananov becomes submerged to
knows every centimetre, every bolt. his neck, there’s only time to save one
And he knows what the sputtering thing. He swims out the door, then
means: a belt transferring power from dives back into the helicopter to free
the engine to the rudder blades has the raft. The water is black and salty
snapped. He also knows what comes and cold—around 2 degrees C.
next. The helicopter is going down. After surfacing, Ananov propels
Ananov switches to autorotation, a himself towards an ice floe 50 metres
safety mode that allows the craft to away, dragging the nine-kilogram raft
glide downward. From a height of 900 with one hand. Killer whales and the
metres, it falls at roughly 15 metres per elusive Greenland shark hunt these
second. The marine fog is thick, so it waters, but they aren’t on his mind.
isn’t until 215 metres above the par- After three gruelling minutes, he
tially frozen sea that the helicopter makes it to the floe. But the ice is a half-
pierces it. With little time to man- metre thick, and the weight of the suit
oeuvre, Ananov aims for an ice floe, makes it impossible to hurl his legs over
realizes he won’t make it, tilts the craft the jagged lip. He keeps trying, the
for safest impact and lands the skids sharp ice scraping away skin, blood
smoothly on the water. running down his forearms. He finds a

48 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
smooth section, presses his chest flat heavier craft, and the pilot had support
against the ice and uses his nails to claw aircraft trailing him. Except for a couple
and shimmy to the top. of friends tracking his progress online,
Every inch of Ananov is soaked, and Ananov was doing it alone.
his upper body is now exposed to the He began by crossing Siberia into
biting wind. He shivers violently, an Alaska, flew south through the western
automatic response to generate heat. United States, then zigzagged across
His shaking hands peel off the suit, and the American heartland. He began at
he flaps it up and down, wringing out dawn and often landed in the dark,
the water. averaging about 800 kilometres a flight.
And it is then, just 15 minutes since He refuelled at local and regional air-
the belt snapped, as he stands on the fields, ate mainly fast food and slept in
ice floe in nothing but his running nearby hotels.
shoes and underwear, that the grim
situation becomes clear to Ananov. He
is trapped on a slab of ice in the Arctic
Circle with no locator beacon, no phone
STRANDED AND
and barely any water. SHIVERING, ANANOV
The fog will hide him from any res- ALLOWS FOR A
cuers. Night will come. Hypothermia FEW MINUTES TO
will set in. And whatever large, power- BEAT HIMSELF UP
ful creatures scratch out their exist- OVER HIS MISTAKES.
ence in this primordial world, maybe
they will come too.
He entered Canada near Montreal,
BACK ON JUNE 13, 2015, the day traversed Quebec and crossed the Hud-
Ananov lifted off from Shevlino, Russia, son Strait to Iqaluit, which is where he
about 32 kilometres from Moscow, the departed from that fateful morning on
then-49-year-old had already set five day 42 of his journey—less than 4,800
world aviation records but nothing as kilometres from home and glory.
ambitious as this latest goal: to become Now, stranded and shivering,
the first person to fly solo around the Ananov allows for a few minutes to beat
world in a helicopter weighing less himself up over his mistakes. If only he
than one tonne. had dived once more and retrieved one
According to the Fédération Aéro- of the GPS trackers or the distress bea-
nautique Internationale, there has been con. If only he had managed to land on
only one successful round-the-world the ice floe. But none of this is possible
solo helicopter flight. But that was in a now. And so he gets to work.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 49
READER’S DIGEST

First he struggles to get back into the ice and can safely navigate to Iqaluit
damp neoprene suit, pulling it up so the alone, Julien steams his ship towards
built-in cap covers his head. He then the pilot’s last known position.
fumbles with the cord to blow up the life
raft, and after several yanks, it inflates. ANANOV KNOWS none of this. He also
He ties it to his leg so it won’t blow away. knows nothing of the predator now
Using the raft as a windshield, he lies tracking him. Somewhere in the strait,
beneath it flat on his stomach. a polar bear has stood upright and is
turning its head back and forth. Its
ABOUT 4,800 kilometres away in San nose is capable of recognizing the
Francisco, a Russian-American pilot scent of a ringed seal under a metre of
friend of Ananov’s named Andrew Kap- snow or a rotting whale carcass 30 kilo-
lin is tracking the flight online and metres away. But this scent? It would
notices that the helicopter’s speed draw a blank, having never encoun-
has flatlined. He and another friend, tered a middle-aged Russian. Moving
Michael Farikh, begin calling around in its pigeon-toed walk, the animal
for help until Kaplin connects with the heads off to inspect.
Joint Rescue Coordination Centre in The summer before, in nearby Arctic
Halifax. Dispatchers send two C-130 Bay, 31-year-old Adrian Arnauyumayuq
Hercules transport aircraft to Ananov’s and his 26-year-old brother-in-law set
last known position, but it’s too late in up camp on an ice floe. In the morning,
the day for a thorough search. they were wakened by a 450-kilogram
Coordinators also radio the Pierre polar bear ripping apart their tent.
Radisson, a 98-metre Canadian Coast Arnauyumayuq grabbed his hunting
Guard icebreaker commanded by knife, stabbed the bear in the face and
Captain Stéphane Julien. But here, too, tried to flee. But the bear pounced,
is a snag—the vessel is at least a day clawing open his back and biting his
away, in Frobisher Bay, escorting a head. Then it flung him aside and went
freighter into Iqaluit. With no other after his brother-in-law, fracturing
icebreakers in the area, Julien cannot his collarbone before Arnauyumayuq
abandon his charge. could grab his rifle and shoot it dead.
The captain understands, however, The Arctic is full of these stories,
how dire Ananov’s situation is. Julien and most do not end in survival—for
has completed 29 Arctic tours, sailed the humans.
the Northwest Passage seven times, About four hours after falling out of
and rescued several people from an icy the sky, Ananov is still on his stomach
death. So three hours later, once the inside his makeshift tent when he hears
freighter has been escorted out of the the sound of heavy breathing and

50 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 Above: Ananov in his
Robinson R22. Left: the
98-metre icebreaker, Pierre
Radisson, that made its way
toward the downed pilot’s
last known position.
(HELI COPTER) COURTESY SERGEY ANANOV; (S HI P ) COURTESY F ISHERI ES & OCE ANS CANADA

crunching snow. He peeks out from attached to his leg and bouncing
under the raft and sees the bear, its fur behind him.
wet after swimming from floe to floe. The bear nimbly launches across to
The creature bobs its snout up and a neighbouring slab, then looks back
down, sniffing the air, then lopes at Ananov, who continues to scream
straight towards him. Stopping about furiously. The bear sits down and
two metres away, the animal is so looks right at the pilot, examining
close that Ananov can see the black of him. Ananov still roars, but now it’s
its footpads and toenails. Biologists not only directed at the bear, but at his
will tell you that, at this point, the bear own utter helplessness.
has one of two motives: hunger or After a minute, the bemused bear
curiosity. Both are bad for the pilot trots off into the Arctic fog.
since polar bears often satisfy their
curiosity with their teeth. THE EUPHORIA and adrenalin from the
If I meet the bear face to face, I will encounter do not last. The hours lum-
die, Ananov thinks. But from some- ber on, and time seems to pass slowly.
where deep in his core a powerful sur- Then Ananov hears the sound of
vival instinct is unleashed. He bolts up, a plane.
flings off the raft, and rushes the He cannot see it because of the fog,
beast—his arms flailing, roaring as but with his clumsy mitts he seizes one
loud as he can. And it works! The bear of the three flares, aims it at the noise
gallops away. But Ananov does not and pulls the cord. A dazzling orange-
stop. He chases the animal to the very red flame shoots into the air. Ananov
edge of the floe, with the raft still hears the plane arc directly overhead,

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 51
 Captain Julien (front row, beside Ananov) and the rest of the crew
of the Pierre Radisson, after rescuing the Russian pilot.

but it continues on. The flare burns for ingesting saltwater would only speed
30 seconds, then fizzles. up the dehydration.
Evening approaches. The cold is Unable to sleep, Ananov thinks
deep and gnawing. The temperature about his wife, Evgueniya, and his
hovers at the freezing point. Ananov children—22-year-old daughter Daria
rations his protein tablets, about 2,000 and 20-year-old son Andrey. At least
calories’ worth, into three-day portions. they are grown, Ananov thinks.
After that, he figures, he will be dead. In the morning, the bear returns.
Humans can go without food for Again Ananov flails, roars, chases the
more than three weeks—so long as beast. It works again, but without food
they have water. Ananov has only the and sapped by the constant shivering—
half-litre that came with the raft. He the only thing keeping his body warm COURTESY F ISHERIES & OCEAN S C AN ADA

has been urinating frequently in his enough to function—he is worn out.

survival suit—a liberating release that Morning passes into afternoon.
also provides moments of warmth. But There is a depression in the ice near the
if his body fluids are not replenished, floe’s edge filled with dazzling aqua-
the resulting dehydration will cause marine water. Ananov sets his life raft
decreased blood flow to muscles, tis- down, creating a sort of waterbed. He
sue cooling and decreased metabolic lies down and dozes, memories spin-
function. His heart would then cease ning backward, until he hears the
working. It would be ironic, of course, familiar crunch of snow.
to die of thirst while surrounded by The bear walks towards him a third
water and even sitting atop it, but time, sniffing the air with its massive

52 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
snout, smelling the human body Julien orders his ship’s GC-366 heli-
beneath the neoprene fabric. Ananov copter into the air with a pilot and two
scares it off in the same manner, then observers. Back on the bridge, a third
staggers back to the raft. He flips it over navigation officer spots a red light on
and crawls beneath. the ice surface.
If the bear returns a fourth time, he Julien takes a compass bearing and
will not have the energy to fight it off. steers towards the point. The rescue
helicopter is notified. They see the final
TWENTY-FIVE HOURS after leaving the splinter of light from Ananov’s last flare.
freighter, fighting the current and nar- Then they spot him. There are no bears
rowly avoiding 20-storey icebergs, the on the floe, but Ananov is once more
Pierre Radisson chugs into the ice floe– running and waving and screaming.
flecked region of Davis Strait where That night aboard the Pierre Radis-
Ananov went down. Rescue coordin- son, 36 hours after his R22 hit the
ators have drawn up a plan based on ocean, Ananov is fed salad with olive
Ananov’s last beacon point, the wind oil and freshly smoked salmon.
and the weather. The mood on deck is Besides his hunger, he’s in surpris-
tense. In a few hours it will be dark, ingly good condition. Everyone wants
making a rescue impossible, leaving to shake his hand and take a photo.
Ananov to spend another night on He obliges, even though this is not
the ice. The overnight low could drop how he wants his name to live on. As
below freezing. he smiles for the phone cameras, he
Then, miraculously, the fog lifts. is already thinking about the new R22
Julien calls dispatchers in Halifax to he will buy, and about how he will
convey the suddenly favourable condi- pack it differently when he once again
tions, but there is only one hour of lifts a helicopter into the sky and
light left and their planes are more points it in the direction of the other
than 300 kilometres away in Iqaluit. side of the world.

POPULAR MECHANICS (FEBRUARY 17, 2016) BY JUSTIN NOBEL ©2016 BY JUSTIN NOBEL, POPULARMECHANICS.COM

STRENGTH IN VULNERABILITY

It’s okay to be afraid, because you can’t

be brave or courageous without fear.
DAVE CHAPELLE

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 53
 As Kids See It

“You’d think there would be a bath app by now.”

MY EIGHT-YEAR-OLD GRANDSON, she’ll be with you in spirit.” After a

Eric, was talking to one of his class- short pause, he replied, “Will she
mates about her recent trip to Disney have to pay to get in?”
World. He mentioned that he would MICHEL LEGAULT, Mo n c t o n , N. B .
be going soon, and he said that it was
unfortunate that his grandmother DAUGHTER: Do you ever play with
CONA N D E VRIES

wouldn’t be able to come along, your hair?

since she had passed away the previ- DAD: Well, I suppose so.
ous July. Trying to comfort him, DAUGHTER: What do you play? Hide
Eric’s classmate said, “Don’t worry, and seek? reddit.com

54 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
SEVEN-YEAR-OLD: When you die,
I don’t think I’ll be able to go to
AND ONE FOR THE KIDS
your funeral.
ME: Why? Will you be too sad? Q: What do you call bears with
SEVEN-YEAR-OLD: I’ll probably no ears?
be travelling. A: B. thoughtcatalog.com

@PAIGEKELLERMAN

MY TWO-YEAR-OLD has a super-

IF I CALL MY three-and-a-half-year-
power: everything he touches
old daughter anything (little girl, big
gets sticky. @A_PANIAGUA
girl, monkey butt, etc.), she will auto-
matically correct me with a reminder
BEFORE I HAD KIDS, I didn’t even
that she is, in fact, a dump truck.
know it was possible to destroy an
reddit.com
entire house with a granola bar.
@LURKATHOMEMOM
I CAME HOME with my hair coloured
and said to my four-year-old grand-
WHEN MY KIDS ACT wild and
son, Declan, “I don’t look like an old
unruly, I use a nice, safe playpen.
bag anymore!”
When they’re finished, I climb out.
“No,” he replied, “you look like a
ERMA BOMBECK, w r i t e r
new one!”
LYNDA BERTIN, Ha m i l t o n
WE COULD LIVE inside the school
bus and my son would still find a way
ALEXA, feed my kids.
to make us late for it every day.
@MOTHERPLAYLIST
@DADANDBURIED

ME: Give Grandpa a hug goodbye.

FIVE-YEAR-OLD: You’re old.
SIX-YEAR-OLD, SHAKING MAGIC
ME: I’m not that old. How old do you
8 BALL: Should I hug Grandpa?
think I am?
(We all wait with bated breath.)
FIVE-YEAR-OLD: The last number.
SIX YEAR-OLD: …No.
reddit.com
(Walks out door.)
reasonsmysoniscrying.com Got a story about your child that never
gets old? Tell us about it! An anecdote
could earn you $50. For details on how
A GROUP OF KIDS is called to submit an anecdote, see page 8 or
a migraine. @FRECKLEDGINGERB visit rd.ca/joke.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 55
 HEART

After I moved away

from my family, observing
the Islamic month of fasting
became painfully lonely—
until I found a new
community that made it
feel like home again

Ramadan
Revisited
BY PAC INTH E M ATTAR FR O M BU ZZ FEED
ILLUSTRATION BY ALLY JAYE REEVES

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 57
READER’S DIGEST

I WAS THREE YEARS OLD when my Ramadan came with us. And when I
family moved from Alexandria, in our lived in Jeddah, Dhahran and Dubai,
native Egypt, to Toronto. Even at that these cities seemed to fast as one.
young age, I sensed that the month of Shops closed for the day, our work
Ramadan was an important time. I and school hours were shortened, and
noticed that my parents weren’t eat- the streets were empty until they
ing or drinking from sunrise to sun- came to life again after sunset and
set. The house grew still, and a kind evening prayers.
of magic hung in the air—as if we had I would return to our house from
an invisible but noteworthy visitor, class, fall into a deep sleep and wake
one who followed us across countries up to the smells of my mother’s lentil
and cultures. soup, stuffed grape leaves, molokheya,
stewed beef, okra, rice and breaded
chicken. I’d sit down with my family,
sleepy-eyed and quiet, and begin eat-
WE MOVED AROUND ing after the athaan announced sun-
A LOT WHEN set prayers and signalled our ability to
I WAS GROWING break fast. Afterwards, there was tea,
UP, BUT WHEREVER dessert and a selection of Egyptian
WE WERE, RAMADAN soap operas custom-made for Ramadan
CAME WITH US. season. With our bellies and hearts
full, we’d pray and head to bed. The
next day before dawn, we’d wake up
By the time I was six, I knew I wanted for suhoor, our early morning meal,
to be part of that magic, too. So one and do it all over again.
evening, while sitting down with my Ramadan has always served as a
family to fitaar (the Egyptian word for reminder of my roots and my faith.
“break fast”), I proudly announced Unlike my parents, who never miss
that I’d only had a few chocolate chip any of the five daily prayers, I’m not
cookies to eat that day. the most observant Muslim. Their
“I fasted, just like you,” I announced, Islam makes faith look effortless, but
beaming. The pride in my parents’ I struggle. For me, Ramadan has
smiles made me want to try harder the always felt like a blank slate, a chance
next day, and for years after that. to try again. And so it became a test
We moved around a lot while I was of devotion and of self—one I didn’t
growing up, from Canada to Saudi want to fail.
Arabia and eventually to the United I never anticipated just how hard it
Arab Emirates. But wherever we were, would get.

58 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
IN 2003, WHEN I WAS 17 years old, Ramadans spent alone bringing me
I left Dubai to attend university in home to?
Toronto, the first woman on either Because the Islamic calendar is
side of my family to move away in lunar, each Ramadan begins 11 days
search of education. I was excited and earlier than the last. So by the time I
daunted to see what life would be like was enrolled in my master’s degree five
as an inbetweener, a child of the dias- years after my arrival in Toronto,
pora whose place was both every- Ramadan was out of the winter months
where and nowhere. Though my and into early fall. The fasts grew lon-
upbringing had instilled a strong sense ger, the loneliness heavier.
of self in me, I wondered who I would I started to develop a private sadness
become on my own. about the month and my faith. I proudly
During Ramadans, there was little identified as Muslim, especially while
of the support I had enjoyed with my living in Canada and far away from fam-
family; instead, I was carrying a full ily. But I often struggled to stay on top
course load, dealing with Canadian of my prayers, and it felt almost blas-
winter and realizing that I shared none phemous to admit that I was wrestling
of my mom’s skills in the kitchen. I with Ramadan.
sometimes broke fast with members Still, I kept fasting. In the years that
of the Muslim Student Association on followed, Ramadan crept back earlier
campus, but I never felt quite at ease. and earlier, eventually landing in the
Occasionally, family friends would middle of summer. At a certain point,
invite me to join them, and for one in 2013, fasting became not just chal-
evening I would be surrounded by lenging but impossible. There came a
familiar sights, smells and sounds. month when, instead of working harder
There were raucous conversations at carrying the weight, I let it fall.
(including jokes about politics), tea,
packed plates and prayer. But more THE FOLLOWING YEAR, with Rama-
often than not, I found myself sitting dan approaching, I wanted to try again.
alone to eat at sunset. If a solo Rama- Although I was nervous to admit that
dan fast was sad, a solitary break fast I had almost given up on my faith, I
was crushing. made a confession on Facebook, say-
It was unsettling to feel so low dur- ing that I needed help. I asked if any-
ing Ramadan. It used to be a reaffirm- body else was looking for some sup-
ing and rejuvenating experience. If port, and if they were, then maybe we
those months of fasting spent with my could encourage each other.
family were a kind of homecoming to The positive response was swift
my faith, what were these difficult and overwhelming. (My dad even

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 59
READER’S DIGEST

weighed in from Kuwait.) And just disappeared and gave way to night. My
like that, a community was born. The father’s childhood neighbours, who
people who joined the group reflected are Coptic Christians, hosted dozens
the Toronto I had grown to love. of us at their place on Lake Ontario, a
There were converts, non-Muslims throwback to when Muslims and Chris-
who wanted to cheer us on, people tians in Egypt shared in Ramadan trad-
who had been in the process of turn- itions together.
ing their backs on their faith, Mus- We also have an online presence
lims who never missed a prayer, newly through the Ramadan Support Group,
arrived Muslims, Muslims who needed where people post questions about
a different kind of community, Mus- the best foods to fuel up on for suhoor
lim misfits. Those who had let Rama- or where to pray taraweeh (a post-
dan fall by the wayside but knew we evening prayer often conducted in a
could do better. For all of us, this was group setting). Converts to Islam ask
a new home. for advice on how to navigate fasting
around family members with different
convictions. Ramadan-themed Drake
memes are a welcome distraction
THE RAMADAN and provide comic relief when we’re
I THOUGHT I’D LOST HAD hungry or craving a cup of coffee dur-
BEEN THERE—I JUST ing long workdays. Members of the
HADN’T RECOGNIZED group have spearheaded charity drives
IT. THIS WASN’T MY and volunteering initiatives, such as
PARENTS’ RAMADAN. packing food baskets and distributing
them to people in need, over the course
of the month.
The inaugural event for this Rama- Since its inception, the group has
dan support group was an open invita- grown from a couple dozen mem-
tion to break the first fast at my house; bers—mostly friends and friends of
only one person came. But since then, friends—to more than 200 across the
there have been intimate gatherings in country. In 2016, for our first break
backyards; sprawling potlucks in the fast, we rented a condo party room,
park, where we’ve feasted on samosas, where over 40 people feasted on
burgers, macaroni pies and Popeyes catered Egyptian food. That night, I
chicken after maghrib prayers (the looked around at the ragtag crew of
ones that take place just after sunset); Muslims, some of whom were meet-
friends, strangers and kids sitting ing for the first time. They all looked
cross-legged on blankets as the sun like family.

60 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
ONE DAY IN 2015, I came to the group this was mine. Ours. A Ramadan that
looking for advice. I was moderating a belonged to a generation of young
talk after a film screening and was Muslims who understood that while it
worried I wouldn’t be sharp enough to could be hard sometimes, we weren’t
do justice to the discussion while fast- giving up on our faith or on each other.
ing for 12-plus hours. I asked: should We could share a dance floor one night
I skip that day and make it up later, or and then find ourselves side by side at
should I still fast and have confidence prayers the next.
that all would go well? The longest days of fasting are over
The generosity and diversity of the now that Ramadan starts in May, but
answers brought me to tears. I ended a month still feels daunting. When the
up moderating the post-film discussion Ramadan greetings and jokes start to
while fasting. The organizers brought stream in through WhatsApp from
me dates and water when maghrib relatives in Egypt, I think of how
time came. If Ramadan had become a Ramadan here would feel unrecogniz-
stranger to me, this was the reconcili- able to them. Yet I’m buoyed by the
ation I had been waiting for. And it was thought that even though I’m cele-
due in large part to the support, kind- brating my 14th Ramadan away from
ness and encouragement I’d received family, I’ve found another version of
from a wildly varied group of Muslims. faith here, with the inbetweeners, who
The Ramadan I thought I’d lost had are making Ramadan—with all its
been there—I just hadn’t recognized it. struggles, anxieties and rewards—still
This wasn’t my parents’ Ramadan; feel like home.

© 2017, PACINTHE MATTAR. FROM BUZZFEED.COM

SHOP AROUND THE CLOCK

I’m going to start acting in real stores the way

I do when online shopping. Break in at 1 a.m.,
put nine things in a cart, leave.
@KINGFIRESTORM (JO FIRESTONE)

I walked by a record store. The sign in the front said they

specialized in hard-to-find records. Nothing was alphabetized.
MITCH HEDBERG

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 61
LIFE LESSON

HOW TO
OVERCOME
BETRAYAL AND
REBUILD TRUST

Cultivating
Confidence
BY DI L IA N A R D U ZZ I
ILLUSTRATION BY VIGG

LARA HARRISON* HAS ALWAYS had calling out his behaviour and getting
a complicated relationship with her angry, but that just led him to shut
father. “He was a hard man,” the Ham- down. Several times, Harrison felt
ilton, Ont., small-business owner says. she’d reached her breaking point,
His moods were unpredictable and and avoided her dad for months. Still,
he would often lash out with criti- she couldn’t abandon him completely.
cism. Being with him felt very volatile. While he remained difficult to get
Over the years, Harrison tried to
keep their relationship functional by *Name has been changed.

62 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
READER’S DIGEST

close to, small actions showed he how to renew confidence in one

cared: he went out of his way to help another is a crucial life skill. If you’re
out with tasks such as renovating her struggling to repair a relationship after
business. Harrison wanted the relation- a breach of trust, there are strategies
ship to improve. that can help.
As her father reached his 70s, she
realized that if they were going to
re-establish trust, they could not waste
time. “I made a conscious decision to
THOSE SEEKING
change my responses to him,” she says. TO REBUILD TRUST
If he was being moody during their time SHOULD FOCUS
together, she’d nonetheless end their ON MAINTAINING AN
interaction by thanking him for the visit HONEST AND
and giving him a hug—something that OPEN DIALOGUE.
wasn’t typical for them. The small inter-
ventions worked; he became kinder
each visit, and his moods stabilized. Overcoming Obstacles
Eventually he began reaching out to One of the biggest barriers to moving
Harrison, texting to ask, “How are you?” past a betrayal is a lack of genuine
or saying he was proud of her, some- desire to do so. “People need to have a
thing she’d always longed to hear. Har- willingness to even try to rebuild trust,”
rison, in turn, felt more trusting: “My says Kathy Offet-Gartner, a psycholo-
heart softened. I was more loving and gist at Mount Royal University in Cal-
willing to receive love from my dad.” gary. That goes for both parties. “Some
believe that we motivate others by
TRUST IS ONE OF the most important offering incentives, making threats or
elements of a safe, fulfilling and well- giving ultimatums,” she explains, but
functioning relationship. Still, it often any promises a person agrees to under
isn’t until something hurtful happens— duress are unlikely to stick. Instead,
a spouse cheats, a boss ridicules us in those seeking to rebuild trust should
front of co-workers—that we think focus on maintaining an open dia-
about trust at all; we don’t notice it logue. “Words matter, and the intent
until it’s broken. behind the words matter,” says Offet-
Trust factors into every one of our Gartner. Because trust is defined dif-
relationships, from preserving our most ferently by different people, we need
important connections to helping us to be able to answer the question,
build new ones. Although it can some- “What does trust mean to me?” If we
times seem impossible, understanding can’t, it will likely be difficult to convey

64 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
to others how we want them to dem- it shows the willingness to rebuild with
onstrate their trustworthiness. respect isn’t there. Anger in itself is a
Effective communication also healthy emotion, Rodrigue explains.
includes sincere gestures—whether “It signals to a person that something
big or small—that can demonstrate is not right in their environment.” But
our dependability, like keeping our constant frustration can be toxic.
promises or making a loved one’s life
simpler by volunteering to help with Focus on the Self
tasks. To re-establish yourself as a trust- It’s tempting to frame breaches of
worthy presence, think ahead about trust in an oversimplified manner: an
what you can do to help the other offending party harming an offended
“feel safe, heard, loved and respected,” party. Sometimes, that clear placement
Offet-Gartner says. of blame is warranted—for instance, in
the case of sexual assault or violent
attack. In exceptional situations such as
these, interacting with your perpetrator
ANGER IN ITSELF isn’t always required—nor is it guar-
IS A HEALTHY EMOTION anteed to be healing.
BUT CONSTANT, In less traumatic instances, however,
ALL-CONSUMING fault lines aren’t necessarily 100 per
FRUSTRATION CAN cent clear. Listen to your inner barom-
BECOME TOXIC. eter. “Learn from the experience, and
ask yourself, ‘What could I do differ-
ently if something like this happens
When possible, letting go of mistakes again?’” says Rodrigue. You might not
is also important, says Vicki-Anne come to the conclusion that you’ve
Rodrigue, the Ontario francophone done anything wrong, or you may be
director for the Canadian Counselling able to pinpoint how some of your
and Psychotherapy Association. If two behaviours contributed to the erosion
people have decided to move past a of trust. Familiarizing ourselves with
betrayal, and one of them says some- our own impressions is also what helps
thing like, “I’ll give you a second chance, us decide whom to have confidence in
but if you mess up, it’s over,” that can down the road. Offet-Gartner suggests
hinder progress—it doesn’t instill con- an analogy: When you turn on the stove
fidence in the offending party. The and put your hand near it, you feel the
inverse is also true. If the offended heat and instinctively pull away. “Inter-
party is told, “You’re so sensitive; why nally, you get messages about people.
can’t you just control your emotions?” Start practising. Start paying attention.”

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 65
READER’S DIGEST

Self-care is also crucial, particularly Despite our best efforts, trust can’t
for individuals whose trust has been always be rebuilt. If all attempts fail,
breached. Exercise can foster good says Rodrigue, it may be time to move
mental health—mood-boosting endor- on—even temporarily. She points out
phins are released into the brain, which that healing can take decades, and that
create a sense of calm, while stress hor- sometimes people find their way back
mones such as cortisol diminish. This to each other over time. “So there is
allows you to “reflect on betrayal with reason to hope.”
clarity,” says Rodrigue. Finally, joining
a support group or faith-based practice
can help those feeling wary of others.
Look for folks who share your experi- TAKING TIME
ence, such as a group for people TO CALM OURSELVES
whose spouses have also cheated. “If CAN ALLOW US TO
there’s a takeaway when a betrayal has ARRIVE IN A SPACE
happened,” says Rodrigue, “it’s, ‘Don’t OF CLARITY AND
isolate yourself. You need community.’” COLLABORATION.
Staying the Course
It’s important to keep in mind that rec- FOR HER PART, Harrison is happy
onciliation won’t happen immediately. she remained optimistic. Rebuilding
“Don’t feel pressured or worried if trust with her father ultimately helped
you’re not healing ‘fast enough,’” says her to engage in self-reflection. She
Rodrigue. When we feel betrayed, our realized she could also be stubborn
brains move into fight-or-flight mode, and mean when she felt threatened,
and it becomes difficult to examine our and that her negative connection to
circumstances rationally. Taking time her father made her less trusting of
to calm ourselves—and move away other people in her life. “I never
from feeling defensive—can allow us to allowed myself to dive deeply into
arrive in a space of collaboration. relationships. At the first sight of chal-
If you’re the one who has broken lenge, I would blame others, get angry
trust, consider approaching the or leave.
betrayed party, but remain patient “The effort it takes to be constantly
and aware of their boundaries. Assure on guard is exhausting,” she says. “It
them that you can see you’ve caused robs you of life’s happy moments.”
pain and deliver a sincere apology. Today, she’s thankful to be able to
Make it clear that you hope to recon- approach others more lovingly and
nect, but are willing to give space. with an open heart.

66 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 MORE GREAT READS ON

Find other
touching quotes
that celebrate
Mother’s Day at
rd.ca/mothers

H E A LT H
The Surprising Reason Why
MORE READER’S Doctors Have Such Sloppy
DIGEST— Handwriting (it’s no coincidence!)
STRAIGHT TO rd.ca/handwriting
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rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 67
 HEALTH

Melanoma is highly treatable, but the

longer it goes unchecked, the more invasive
the treatment. That’s why diagnosis and prevention
are key, as Sydney Loney found out first-hand.

CANCER:
IT HAPPENED TO ME
FR O M BE ST H E A LT H
ILLUSTRATION BY MELANIE LAMBRICK

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 69
READER’S DIGEST

always had a good handle on AFTER MY BIOPSY, I needed a second

I
my ABCDs. The trouble was, procedure to remove a wider, deeper
I’d forgotten about “E.” In area of skin to ensure that there were no
December 2015, I was shaving lingering cancer cells. When I arrived
my legs when I noticed a mole at the hospital for my appointment, all
on the outside of my left knee. 80 seats in the clinic were full, occupied
It had been there forever but by people of all ages and backgrounds.
suddenly looked darker than I When you’re sitting in a waiting
remembered. And yet it was symmetri- room for hours, you can only spend so
cal, had an even border, was all one much time looking at your phone.
colour and had a small diameter, so I Eventually, people started sharing
told myself it was fine. I figured I’d get their stories. I met a man in his 50s
it checked out when I had more time. who worked in construction and was
I finally saw my family doctor three having a third melanoma removed
months later. “It’s probably nothing from his back and a nursing student in
to worry about,” she said. Still, she her 20s whose mother had died of
booked an appointment for me to see melanoma. She was having a second
a dermatologist, just to be safe. It turns mole removed from her chest.
out that the “E” I’d overlooked stands Between 80 and 90 per cent of skin
for “evolving” and, when it comes to cancers are caused by ultraviolet radi-
skin cancer detection, it’s the most ation, but melanoma originates from
important letter of all. normal pigment cells called melano-
Dr. Lisa Kellett, a Toronto derma- cytes. Like any other cell, they can
tologist, took one look at my mole and become cancerous. Melanomas are
did a biopsy on the spot. The results most often found on the chest and
were back within a week: it was stage back in men and on the legs in women,
one malignant melanoma. “You’re a but they can also appear on the soles
good example of how skin cancer of the feet, the palms of the hands and
doesn’t always meet the ABCD cri- inside the mouth.
teria,” she told me. When you talk to people who have
Skin cancer rates have been rising in been diagnosed with skin cancer, they
Canada and account for one-third of can often pinpoint lapses in sun safety
all new cancers. There are 80,000 new that may be to blame. I immediately
cases each year—more than the num- thought about the summers I spent
ber of breast, prostate, lung and colon teaching sailing at a girls’ camp in
cancers combined. The largest con- northern Ontario. Wading into the lake
tributing factor, says Kellett, is that to rig a Laser with a group of nine-year-
people aren’t protecting their skin. olds meant that any sunscreen—hastily

70 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
and, let’s face it, often sporadically start,” she said. “A little scabby thing
applied—was washed away before I on the side of my head was the least of
even set sail. my worries.”
Linda Thiessen recalls sunny days
spent on the ski slopes when she ALTHOUGH A FASTER diagnosis does
would get hot, take off her hat and lead to faster treatment, most Canadi-
badly burn her forehead. The 63-year- ans don’t realize that there are gaps in
old from Coquitlam, B.C., had her first care when it comes to skin cancer. In
skin cancer—basal cell carcinoma, the 2015, a year after her husband died,
most common form of the disease— Thiessen finally saw a dermatologist
removed in 2003. “That diagnosis and was diagnosed with her 14th basal
struck fear into my heart,” says Thies- cell carcinoma. Because it had gone
sen, “but I was lucky because it was unchecked for so long, Thiessen needed
superficial and easily treated.” Mohs surgery.
She has had 12 basal cell cancers Mohs is used to identify and remove
removed by excision (complete removal a tumour one layer at a time, without
by cutting out) and biopsy (partial harming the healthy tissue surround-
removal) since then, and she knows ing it, and to treat basal and squamous
what to look for. Still, when she noticed cell cancers, as well as some melan-
a spot on her temple in 2013, she put omas. It’s considered an improvement
off dealing with it. Her husband had over standard surgery, or excision,
advanced Parkinson’s disease and his which involves removing the visible
health was deteriorating. cancer and a small margin of sur-
“I’d lie awake at 3 a.m. and think ‘I rounding healthy tissue all at once and
really should get this checked out,’ but waiting for the results. Because it’s
then I’d get up and the day would possible to verify that all cancer cells

LEARN YOUR ABCDEs

“A” stands for asymmetrical. Does the mole or spot have an irregular shape
with two parts that look very different?
“B” stands for border. Is the border irregular or jagged?
“C” is for colour. Is the colour uneven?
“D” is for diameter. Is the mole or spot larger than the size of a pea?
“E” is for evolving. Has the mole or spot changed during the past few weeks
or months?

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 71
READER’S DIGEST

have been removed at the time of sur- cancers, such as those of the liver,
gery, Mohs reduces the need for addi- lungs and ovaries,” she says, “and it’s
tional procedures and increases the highly curable if caught early.”
odds that the cancer will be cured. The But most important, she says, is pre-
problem is getting it when you need it. vention. “Sun damage is cumulative,”
To avoid the nine-month waiting list Ulmer says. “So you need to stop accu-
in B.C., Thiessen booked a ticket to mulating damage. You can’t change the
Edmonton, where Dr. Mariusz Sapi- past, but you can change your behav-
jaszko, medical director of the Western iour now.”
Canada Dermatology Institute and
Youthful Image Clinic, performed her
surgery in 2016. Sapijaszko explained
that her cancer had grown like an
I NOW GET
octopus under the surface of her skin.
MY SKIN CHECKED
The procedure required six tissue PROFESSIONALLY
removals, in ever-widening circles, until EVERY SIX MONTHS
he was able to get clear tissue. AND I SIGNED UP
FOR MOLE MAPPING.
THE LONGER SKIN cancer goes
undiagnosed, the more invasive the
treatment, which is why diagnosis and In 2012, Sophie Belanger had what
prevention are so important. “Know had looked like a pimple, but was actu-
your body,” says Sapijaszko. “If some- ally basal cell cancer, removed from
thing is different and doesn’t go away under her left eye. “I don’t remember
in a month or two, ask your doctor if my mom ever putting sunscreen on
this is normal.” He adds that patients me,” says the 45-year-old business-
and family members find the majority woman from Calgary. “We just didn’t
of skin cancers. “We’re good at diag- know any better back then.” She has
nosing cancer, but our patients are the two teenage daughters for whom sun
ones who find it.” protection has become a habit. “It’s
Dr. Marcie Ulmer, a board-certified just part of their lifestyle now,” says
medical and cosmetic dermatologist at Belanger. “When they play soccer, sun-
Pacific Dermaesthetics in Vancouver, screen is part of their equipment.”
recommends checking your birthday Unfortunately, not all sunscreens are
suit monthly on every calendar day of created equal, says Dr. Ken Alanen, a
your birthday. “Skin cancer is the most dermatologist, dermatopathologist and
detectable because it occurs on an Mohs skin cancer surgeon in Calgary.
organ we can see, unlike other types of An SPF above 40 (the measure of a

72 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
product’s sun-protection factor) is a What Alanen does recommend is
marketing tool, he says. “An SPF of 40 zinc. “Zinc is natural—it’s basically
gives you 98 per cent protection. Any- ground-up rock—and blocks out the
thing higher doesn’t make a difference.” entire range of UV light. It’s the longest-
Also, SPF mostly protects against lasting ingredient, as well.” He says
UVB filtration (five per cent of UV rays), the ideal sunscreen contains at least
not UVA filtration, which accounts 20 per cent zinc.
for 95 per cent of UV rays and is now Investing in a new sunscreen is just
believed to contribute to, and possibly one of the changes I’ve made since my
even initiate, the development of skin diagnosis over two years ago. I still
cancers. “UVB is what burns you,” he enjoy the outdoors, but now you’ll
says. “Tanning is not safe; there is no find me under a big hat or in a shady
such thing as a healthy tan.” spot if the UV index—our system for
Finally, don’t rely on moisturizer or measuring the strength of the sun’s
makeup for sun protection. Alanen says rays—is three or higher. I also get my
that the United States Food and Drug skin checked professionally every six
Administration is proposing new guide- months and have just signed up for
lines that won’t allow sun protection mole mapping so doctors can com-
claims on moisturizers and makeup. pare photos of my moles onscreen at
I pulled out my favourite foundation every visit. (An app called MoleMap-
and ran the ingredients by Alanen: five per, which a scientist designed to help
per cent titanium dioxide and five per his wife monitor her moles between
cent zinc oxide. “Titanium doesn’t dermatologist visits, is available in the
block enough UVA, and neither con- Apple App Store.)
centration of five per cent is enough,” Above all, I check every inch of my
he told me. “The product is likely skin on the 15th of every month. I
cosmetically agreeable but of dubi- hope I won’t see something different,
ous clinical benefit.” So much for my but if I do, I won’t be too busy to do
preferred “sunscreen.” something about it.

IF AUSTEN TWEETED...

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a woman

in possession of an idea on the Internet,
must be in want of correction.
@HELS

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 73
ENVIRONMENT

Humpback whales are known

to put themselves in danger
to save the life of another
species. Is it animal
altruism, or is
something else
at work?

The O cean’s
Unexpected
Heroes
BY E L IN K E L S E Y F R OM H A KAI MAG AZ I N E
IN 1982, WHILE I WAS ATTENDING the University
of Guelph, the owner of Peter Clark Hall, a college
pub, offered me a job as a bouncer. He reasoned
that folks would be less likely to get into a brawl
with a friendly female than they would a large,
hairy dude.
Always a sucker for a social science experiment,
I gamely took the gig. One black eye and a wrenched
shoulder later, I quit. What my boss and I hadn’t
fully appreciated is that by the time a person needs
to be removed from a bar, his or her capacity to
discern who is doing the removing has vanished.
When the urge to fight erupts, any target will do.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 75
READER’S DIGEST

I shared this story with Fred Sharpe, turns out, deliberately interfere with
a humpback whale researcher with attacking orcas to help others in dis-
the Alaska Whale Foundation, and he tress. And they don’t just defend their
described the remarkable capacity own babies or close relatives. They
humpback whales have to do just intervene on behalf of other species—
what those drunks could not—hone a grey whale calf with its mother, a seal
their aggression. hauled out on an ice floe, an ocean
sunfish. Humpbacks act to improve
the welfare of others, the classic defini-
tion of altruism.
A FULL-GROWN
30- TO 40-TONNE FIRST-PERSON ACCOUNTS of animals
HUMPBACK PRESENTS saving other animals are rare. Robert
A FORMIDABLE Pitman, a marine ecologist with the
FORCE AGAINST United States National Oceanic and
A KILLER WHALE. Atmospheric Administration, describes
a revelatory encounter he witnessed in
Antarctica in 2009. A group of killer
“The bulls love to fight. It’s like Sat- whales had washed a Weddell seal they
urday night in the Octagon,” he says, were attacking off of an ice floe. The seal
referring to the Ultimate Fighting swam frantically toward a pair of hump-
Championship venue. “You’ll be in a backs that had inserted themselves into
whale-watching boat at an appropriate the action. One of the humpbacks rolled
distance and all these males will be over on its back, and the 400-kilogram
thrashing on each other. They’re seal was swept onto its chest, between
bloodied and charged up, and the fact the whale’s massive flippers. When
that they don’t redirect all that agita- the killer whales moved in closer, the
tion toward the occupants of the boat humpback arched its chest, lifting the
is remarkable. With a great deal of seal out of the water. And when the seal
(P REVI OUS S PREA D) M ASTERF ILE

predators, if you got in the middle of started slipping off, the humpback,
that, it would be aimed at you in an according to Pitman, “gave the seal a
instant. Humpbacks are these amazing gentle nudge with its flipper, back to the
Buddhist warriors.” middle of its chest. Moments later, the
Ascribing Buddhist-like qualities to seal scrambled off and swam to the
humpbacks seems particularly apt in safety of a nearby ice floe.”
light of recent revelations about how “That incident convinced me,” he
these large baleen whales use their says. “Those humpbacks were doing
superpowers for good. Humpbacks, it something we couldn’t explain.”

76 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 Pitman started asking other research- a killer whale attack when they were
ers and whale watchers to send him young or have lost a calf to killer-whale
similar accounts. Soon he was poring predation, respond to these traumas
through observations of 115 encounters by going on the offensive. Sharpe con-
between humpbacks and killer whales, curs that the severity of a past inter-
recorded over 62 years. “There are some action could affect an individual.
pretty astonishing videos of humpbacks A full-grown 30- to 40-tonne hump-
charging killer whales,” he says. back presents a formidable force
In a 2016 article in Marine Mammal against a killer whale, which weighs in
Science, a prominent scientific journal, at a maximum of six tonnes. Each enor-
Pitman and his co-authors describe this mous flipper can measure up to five
behaviour and confirm that such acts of metres, or almost half the length of a
do-gooding are widespread. They have telephone pole. Razor-sharp barnacles
been taking place for a long time and encrust the knobby leading edge of
have been seen in locations all over these appendages, and the whales
the world. “Now that people know what brandish them with great dexterity.
to look for, especially people out on Humpbacks are the only species of
whale-watching boats, they see it fairly baleen whales to carry their own offen-
regularly,” Pitman says. “Everybody sive and defensive weaponry. Though
now understands that this is going on.” killer whales have teeth and are more
But knowing that something is hap- agile, a blow from the massive hump-
pening and understanding why it’s back tail or flipper could be fatal.
happening are two different things. Pit- Killer whales recognize the danger.
man and his co-authors openly ponder When confronted by a ferociously bel-
the meaning of these encounters. lowing mob of adult humpbacks, the
“Why,” they wrote, “would humpbacks predators will eventually flee. Hump-
deliberately interfere with attacking backs usually work in pairs to fend off
killer whales, spending time and energy killer whales, but lone humpbacks
on a potentially injurious activity, espe- have been observed taking on 10 or
cially when the killer whales … were more individuals. These battles can be
attacking other species of prey?” hard won. Humpbacks sometimes
Mammal-eating killer whales attack spend hours mobbing killer whales,
young humpbacks, so it’s possible that never stopping to rest and feed.
humpbacks mob them as a general- Intriguingly, humpbacks don’t just
ized anti-predator behaviour, just as stumble upon killer-whale attacks.
crows will mob a perched bald eagle. They race toward them like firefighters
It could also be that specific hump- into burning buildings. And like those
backs, individuals that have survived rescue workers, humpbacks don’t

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 77
READER’S DIGEST

know who is in danger until they get “There is part of the human brain that
there. That’s because the sound that is associated with pro-social behav-
alerts them to an attack isn’t the plain- iour,” he explains. “But we are so lim-
tive voice of the victim. It’s the excited ited because we can’t put EEGs or PET
calls of the perpetrators. scans on free-ranging larger whales.”
Transient killer whales tend to be
silent when they are hunting, but they SO ARE HUMPBACKS compassionate?
become very noisy when they finally Scientists, Sharpe tells me, shy away
attack. Pitman believes humpbacks from using the same descriptors we use
have one simple instruction: “When for humans. “What is exciting about
you hear killer whales attacking, go humpbacks is that they are directing
break it up.” their behaviour for the benefit of other
But humpbacks also display remark- species,” he says. “But there’s no doubt
able capacities for subtlety. Sharpe calls that there are important differences
them “hypercultural beings,” pointing between human compassion and ani-
out how adaptable they are, and good mal compassion.”
at learning from each other. “Their abil- When I pose the same question to
ity to pick up on social nuance in some Pitman, he agrees. “When a human
ways far surpasses ours,” he says. protects an imperilled individual of
When I ask if humpbacks are aware another species, we call it compassion.
of the suffering of others, which is one If a humpback whale does so, we call
of the defining characteristics of com- it instinct. But sometimes the distinc-
passion, he shares a story of a hump- tion isn’t all that clear.”
back that died in Hawaii about a We now recognize cultural differ-
decade ago. “The whale had its head ences within whale, primate, elephant
down in the water and was no longer and other species in ways that were
breathing,” says Sharpe. “It attracted unimaginable just decades ago. Stud-
a lot of unusual interest from other ies of animal emotions proliferate,
humpbacks—they were approaching and with them come challenging
it and caressing it.” questions about how to best interpret
Similar behaviour has been observed what looks like compassion and altru-
in mother whales that have lost their ism in other species. Just how these
calves, he added. The whales will carry acts differ from our own behaviours
the dead young around with them for may be hard to pinpoint.
hours after they have died, seemingly In 2014, commuters in a crowded
unwilling to let go. railway station in northern India, for
Sharpe laments how difficult it is to example, watched a male rhesus
test what’s going on in whales’ minds. macaque attempt to resuscitate an

78 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
unconscious macaque that had been University of Michigan, is that they
electrocuted while walking on high- challenge the strongly held belief that
tension wires. A video of the incident we need to be taught to be altruistic
shows the rescuer nipping, massaging, through social norms. His findings
shaking and repeatedly plunging the indicate otherwise.
victim into water. The life-saving effort Chimpanzees, as well as children too
lasts 20 minutes, until the monkey young to have learned the rules of
miraculously revives. politeness, spontaneously engage in
helpful behaviours, even when they
have to stop playing or overcome obsta-
cles to do so. The same results have
COMPASSION, been duplicated with children in Can-
IT TURNS OUT, ada, India and Peru, as well as with
IS INNATE— chimps at the Ngamba Island Chim-
AND DEFINITELY panzee Sanctuary in Uganda and other
NOT LIMITED research centres around the world.
TO OUR SPECIES. The chimps helped people they knew
and human strangers, too.
Compassion, it turns out, is innate—
In an attempt to decipher what qual- and definitely not limited to our spe-
ities of compassion might be uniquely cies. Human beings and other animals
human, I binge-watch videos. I am have what Dacher Keltner, a professor
captivated by footage from the Max of psychology at the University of Cal-
Planck Institute for Evolutionary ifornia, Berkeley, calls a “compassion-
Anthropology showing a series of ate instinct.”
experiments in which a toddler volun-
tarily totters across a room to assist an STEVE COLE, a genomics researcher at
apparently clumsy researcher who the University of California, Los Ange-
needs help reaching objects or com- les reveals an intriguing insight into
pleting simple tasks. The same basic threat biology that might shed further
helpful behaviour happens later in the light on why humpbacks willingly enter
video, when the experiment is repeated into dangerous altercations with killer
with chimpanzees. whales. He explains that scientists used
What’s powerful about these tests, to think that the circuitry for detecting
according to Felix Warneken, the and responding physiologically to
researcher who led the study and the threatening circumstances was there to
director of the Social Minds Lab, in protect the survival of the individual.
the psychology department at the But that is no longer the case.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 79
READER’S DIGEST

Studies in threat neurobiology sug- All altruism involves some benefit

gest that those circuits are there to for the helper, Cole agrees. According
defend the things individuals care to him, it’s biologically difficult to call
about. “This is why you get soldiers anything “true altruism” because, as
running into a hail of gunfire for the he says, “Helping others almost always
country they love,” says Cole. “These doses us with some kind of dopamin-
people are in adverse environments, ergic reward.”
but they are acting as if they are in non- Indeed, the happiness we derive
threatening environments simply when we act on behalf of the greater
because they are attached to some kind good shows up in our cells as a better
of big purpose or cause that’s greater immune response profile, says Cole.
than their own individual well-being.” While we might feel just as happy eat-
I wonder what humpback whales ing ice cream as we do volunteering at
care deeply enough about to actively a beach cleanup, at a cellular level,
swim into battle with killer whales. happiness derived from meaningful
When I ask Pitman, he tells me that, service to others is correlated with
ultimately, it still comes down to self- positive health benefits.
ishly preserving their own kind. He Sharpe says it’s important to step
believes that their occasional rescues back and appreciate the wonder of
of humpback calves create a strong the act itself. “It’s easy to get lost in
enough motive for them to rush in to the nuance and come up with high
help, even if it means they end up sav- standards of how you interpret this
ing sunfish, sea lions, dolphins and a behaviour,” he says. “But the fact is,
grey-whale calf every now and then. you have seals on the bellies of
“It’s the net effect that is working for humpbacks. You know, it’s just a really
them,” he explains. cool phenomenon.”

© 2017, ELIN KELSEY. FROM HAKAI MAGAZINE (AUGUST 15, 2017). HAKAIMAGAZINE.COM

THE TRUTH ABOUT CATS

“MY cat is like a dog.” –Every cat owner

@THEGUYDF

“You only live once.” –A pessimistic cat

@MRNICKHARVEY

80 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 @ Work

“Most people use the cloud. We just stuff paperwork in the ceiling tiles.”

NEED FOR SPEED LIGHT ROAST

During my brother-in-law’s first I like to lightheartedly tell my
performance review, his boss said, co-workers, “Don’t even talk to me
“I’m not quite sure what it is you do until I’ve had my coffee!” And then
here. But whatever it is, could you I never get coffee. @HEYJULIAJOHNS
do it faster?”
JEANIE WAARA SAY WHAT?
INTERVIEWER: It says here your big-
SUSA N CAM ILLERI KONAR

ONCE, AFTER WORK, my boss, a gest weakness is focusing.

self-titled “email man,” sent me a text ME: Probably mashed potatoes.
message instructing me to check my @CLICHEDOUT
inbox. I rushed over to my computer
Are you in need of some professional
and pulled up the important missive. motivation? Send us a work anecdote,
It contained two words: “Call me.” and you could receive $50. To submit
MARTIN HOFFMANN your stories, visit rd.ca/joke.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 81
DEPARTMENT OF WIT

To Be
What if the cameras had kept
rolling after these legendary
movie lines?

Continued…
BY J E R E M Y WO O D CO C K ILLUSTRATION BY JULIA MONSON

CASABLANCA LOUIS: Let’s play a game called “try

RICK: Ilsa, I’m no good at being to name something less romantic
noble, but it doesn’t take much to than a hill of beans.” I’ll go first:
see that the problems of three little nothing. I win.
people don’t amount to a hill of RICK: I got nervous. I didn’t know
beans in this crazy world. what to say. It worked in the moment.
Here’s looking at you, kid. LOUIS: When I get nervous, I’ll
(Ilsa gets on the plane. Louis sidles pause, maybe even stammer. I don’t
up to Rick.) go straight to legume imagery.
LOUIS: What was that? RICK: Yeah, I suppose we just get
RICK: Hm? nervous differently.
LOUIS: A hill of— (a beat)
RICK: Oh, that. Don’t ask. I know. LOUIS: And “Here’s looking at you,
I was figuring to be romantic. kid,” that was a real gem. I mean, if

82 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
you hadn’t said that, how would she THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK
even know you were looking at her? YODA: Try not. Do or do not. There is
RICK: Oh, go jump into a hill no try.
of beans. LUKE SKYWALKER: Oh.
(a beat)
FORREST GUMP LUKE: That’s a really intense rule.
FORREST GUMP: My momma Does that work with other students?
always said life was like a box of YODA: Worked for many students,
chocolates. You never know what it has.
you’re going to get. LUKE: Okay. Well, it’s a little much for
EXTRA (passing by): Could you me. It’s not that I’m not willing to put
repeat that? in the effort; I learned new grammar
FORREST: Pardon? just to communicate with you. Maybe
EXTRA: What is it your momma said? you can give me a break on the “even
FORREST: Life is like a box of— trying is not acceptable” philosophy?
EXTRA #2 (painting the bench): I YODA: Thank me one day, you will.
heard him, too. Didn’t she ever look LUKE: Cool. I mean that doesn’t
underneath the lid? really feel like an answer, but cool.
FORREST: Well, she— (a beat)
EXTRA: It literally says what you’re LUKE: Hey, so just checking, will
going to get. you be at my birthday on Tatooine
FORREST: That’s all I got to say next month?
about that. YODA: Many hundreds of years old, I
EXTRA: I mean, that feels a little am. Travel so well anymore, I do not.
passive-aggressive. No need to take LUKE: You’re saying you won’t
this personally. be there?
EXTRA #2: It’s just basic factual YODA: No! No. Saying that, I am not.
information. Either an analogy works LUKE: So then you will be there!
or it doesn’t. Tremendous! I’ll get them to add
EXTRA: Maybe something like, “My another chair, a small one.
momma always said life is like a box YODA: Saying that, I am not either.
of chocolates. You won’t know what LUKE: I thought it was either yes or
you’re going to get unless you take a no. Black or white. Do or do not.
second to check the notes?” YODA: Perhaps, sometimes excep-
EXTRA #2: Perfect. tions, there are.
FORREST: But that’s not what LUKE: So will you be there?
momma said. YODA: I’ll—(sigh). Try, I will.
EXTRA: Tell momma she shoulda. LUKE: That’s what I thought.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 83
Comet and author
Donna Kane in the
Northern Caribou
Range, B.C.
 EDITORS’ CHOICE

When her husband

leaves for a three-month
expedition through northern
British Columbia, Donna Kane
must stay behind to nurse
an injured gelding. What she
learns during quiet moments with
the horse transforms them both.

FR O M SU M M E R O F T H E H O R S E

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 85
READER’S DIGEST

NEAR THE GATAGA RIVER in British

Columbia’s northern Rockies lies a chain
of lung-shaped lakes unnamed on just
about every map. The most easterly lake
is the one I know best because in the spring
of 2006, at the age of 47, I fell in love with
a wilderness guide. That summer, my heart
on fire, a float plane flew me to his cabin—
my new home—on the shore of what’s
known as Mayfield Lake.
Wayne had already arrived with his As our plane landed, Wayne was a
string of horses and expedition guests speck on the wharf growing larger, the
after having travelled for six weeks, long, lean length of him taking shape
starting from Mile 442 of the Alaska as we neared. I was certain I’d lose my
Highway. Accompanying me on the balance walking the plane’s float to the
(P REVI OUS S PREA D) WAYN E SAWCH UK

plane were photographers, painters, wharf, as if falling would confirm my

filmmakers and fellow writers arriving recklessness in crossing from one life
for a seven-day wilderness camp. When to another. As I stepped from the pon-
that was over, Wayne and I would be toon onto the dock, Wayne reached
alone for two weeks until a final group out his hand.
of clients would be flown in and all of “Hi there,” I ventured. “You made
us would travel together back out to the it,” Wayne said, and as we hugged, his
highway. It would be Wayne’s last expe- laugh resonated from his chest to mine.
dition of the season and the first of its By the lake, there was a bench where
kind, ever, for me. we’d sit listening to the loons. That

86 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
first summer, a family of otters played northern Rockies, descending into
near the shore one afternoon. Watch- boreal forest, along swamps and sand
ing them, I felt sick with guilt for hav- flats, across creeks and rivers, to
ing left my husband of 25 years and finally arrive at camp, where they are
ached for my two children, though unpacked, hobbled and let go for the
they were grown. night. In the morning, we find them
where the grass suits them best or in
ONE MORNING, A FEW DAYS into the an area the alpha of the herd has had
trek to the highway, Wayne is dressed a mind to go.
and out of the tent before I’ve man- For three months of the year, it is
aged to open my eyes. One of the Wayne’s life too. Every two weeks a
guests has already lit the campfire new group comes in to replace those
and set a kettle of water on the grill. going out. Some of the people are

FOR THREE MONTHS OF THE YEAR,

THE HORSES TRAVEL OVER THE MOUNTAIN
PASSES OF THE NORTHERN ROCKIES.

Others are rummaging through pan- already familiar with the outdoors
niers asking for the oatmeal, and a and want to become more aware of
delighted voice cries out, “Oh look, the Muskwa–Kechika, this area that is
here it is!” It’s six in the morning. How the size of Ireland. Others are looking
can they be so chipper? for something. Adventure, but also a
By the time I’ve taken down our tent, chance to reflect on their lives.
Wayne has collected the halters and is The first time Wayne introduced
ready to find the horses. There are 17 me to the horses, I spooked them.
in all: seven for riding, nine for pack- They could sense my nervousness
ing, and a spare, in case one is injured and became nervous, too. Although
and needs a day off. I’ve come to know them better, I still
For three months of the year, this is seem to somehow end up putting
the horses’ life. Each day they carry things on backwards or in the wrong
their riders or soft packs or panniers order. I am bewildered, struck by what
filled with tins of fish and bags of rice I am left with when everything I know
over the mountain passes of the has changed.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 87
 Top: Wayne Sawchuk, Kane and their dog,
Chance. Bottom: The pack string traverses the
grassy hillsides along West Tuchodi Lake, B.C.
 IT IS 2013, over eight years since the As Wayne’s business grows, someone
day of the book fair in Dawson Creek, needs to be home to look after the
B.C., where Wayne and I first met. We bookkeeping and the logistics of get-
now live 40 kilometres away, outside ting people and supplies in and out of
the town of Rolla, in an old farmhouse the mountains.
to which we added two guesthouses While Wayne is away, I receive an
for clients. Wayne is off to Vancouver, early-morning email from him asking
to a board meeting with the Canadian that I check on the horses. Brian, an
Parks and Wilderness Society, a posi- artist who is helping out with the
tion he’s held as part of his advocacy chores, receives the same email. He
work for the Muskwa–Kechika Man- says he will look in on the horses as I
agement Area. Four days after that, he get ready for my day.
will leave on the first leg of the sum- A few minutes later, Brian opens the
mer’s expeditions. gate and sees a pool of blood in the

COMET, THE BIG SORREL GELDING,

HAS BITE MARKS ON HIS BACK AND THE
HIDE IS RIPPED FROM HIS SHOULDER .

“Rob should be here in a few hours,” muck and blood spattered on the planks
Wayne says, referring to the farrier com- of the corral. Then he spots Comet, the
ing to trim and shoe the horses’ hooves. big sorrel gelding with a straw-coloured
“I’ve put the horses who still need to be mane, bite marks on his back, hide
shod in the pen. When Rob’s done, he’ll ripped from the shoulder, the thick
let them back out into the pasture.” leather of it hanging.
I know Wayne needs to go to the The farrier, Rob, hadn’t come the
meeting, but the fact that he’s leaving previous day. The horses had stayed in
me with the worry of Rob and a host of their pen all night without food or water
other tasks right when the arts and and in their restless state had picked
WAY NE SAWCHUK

music festival I help run is taking place on Comet, the lowest in their pecking
irritates me. order. Comet must have been pushed
With every year that passes, I spend against the railing of the pen, because
less and less time writing. I spend less somewhere in the tussle a plank had
time in the Muskwa–Kechika as well. broken off and a bolt had hooked into

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 89
READER’S DIGEST

his hide and torn him open. Someone There are antibiotics that Comet will
should have checked on them. Some- need to take orally for 10 days; fly
one should have checked with Rob. repellent called Swat to be applied
That someone was me. I feel nauseous. around the outer rim of the wound;
I have to pick up a visiting poet at and Fura-Zone—an anti-infective—to
the airport, leaving Brian to wait for be squirted on the wound itself. The
the vet. I don’t see the stitching, the hosing is to begin right away.
tetanus shot, the painkillers. I don’t Brian has already strung garden
hear the vet say how lucky Comet is hoses together so they reach the corral
that the wound is where it is: the where Comet is to be confined. He can
horse will live. But Comet will need see my hesitation but hands me the
two hosings a day for 20 minutes each hose. “You may as well start now,” he
for at least two months; he will need says. “You’re the one who will be doing

THE WOUND IS ITS OWN CONTINENT,

A LAND FORMED BY AN UNDERLYING
GEOLOGY OF FLESH AND MUSCLE.

ointments and antibiotics. It will take this.” I feel an undercurrent of worry.

a long time for the wound to heal. It’s true—when Wayne’s expedition
leaves in a few days, Brian is going too.
AFTER I RETURN FROM the airport, I go “There goes my summer,” I say to
out to Comet. If I spread out my hands, Wayne when he returns from Vancou-
it would take 15 of them to cover Com- ver. And as always when I complain,
et’s wound. And where the wound is he nods. Wayne is unfailingly sympa-
deepest, where the muscles are cut and thetic. Also, not once has he suggested
exposed, is a hollow so deep that if I that this might not have happened had
lifted the hide to fully expose it, I think I bothered to check on the horses.
I could stick my head inside. “Well, what should we do about it?”
“Horses have a lot of mass,” my friend he says.
Emilie says when she comes over for a I don’t want Emilie to take care of
look. “It’s not as bad as it seems.” Comet, which she’s offered to do.
“Good,” I say. “Because it looks like Maybe I enjoy being a martyr. Maybe
the horse will die.” I need to prove I can do this. Or maybe,

90 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
and this is the thought that settles think of phoning Emilie, but I can’t give
inside me, I’m curious to know what it up that fast. I loosen the rope and tie it
is to heal a wound. to a lower rung of the corral so he can’t
rear his head. I push the syringe into his
I HAVE TO SET my alarm for 6 a.m. mouth again and squeeze the plunger.
each morning to hose Comet. One Some of the antibiotic dribbles back out
good thing about my anxiety regard- of Comet’s mouth. I loosen the rope so
ing the horse’s health is that the adren- Comet can move his head freely, and
alin rush of my fear makes it easier to then I turn on the hose. The water
get out of bed. touches the open flesh and Comet
With vet supplies in hand, I walk out jumps to the side and then holds still.
to the horse’s pen with as much resolve As I spray his shoulder, the water
as I can muster. Comet, you are going unhooks ragged flesh, some of it crusty
to let me put the syringe in your mouth. with pus, some of it stuck to the stitches
You are going to let me halter you and and looking like crushed bumblebees.
hose you for 20 minutes twice a day. There is blood on Comet’s nose so I
Whatever happens, it certainly won’t know he’s been biting at his wound.
be because I haven’t done exactly what “The spraying activates the healing
the vet has instructed. process,” the vet had told me, “and it
Comet is standing at the far end of keeps the wound clean.”
the pen. He looks pathetic. His wound At 20 minutes exactly, I stop. It’s like
gapes as if an entity has assumed con- a recipe. Twenty minutes is what it
trol. A friendly mare called Bailey and seems to take for the flesh and scabbed
a young pinto gelding named Ronnie skin to soften and start to peel away,
were held back from the expedition, for the bits of straw to loosen and fall,
the idea being that they’d be company the wound opening back to raw.
for Comet, even though they’d have
to stay on the other side of the fence to WAYNE HAS BEEN GONE for 10 days.
allow him to heal. I’ve heard from him twice. Because his
“Hey Comet,” I say. I get the halter satellite phone must be turned off to
on him then lead him to the inside save batteries, I wait for him to call me.
pen, where the hose awaits. He follows I make lists of the things I need to tell
easily. I tie him to the fence, stick the him or ask him, the most recent one
syringe into the side of his mouth, and being, “Where is the temporary elec-
for a moment forget that he is wounded. tric fencing?” I’ve decided that Comet
The power with which he jerks his body needs a better place to live. There’s
backwards, tossing his head into the nothing for him to explore. I figure I can
air, feels absolute. My heart races. I put him in the bigger fenced-in area

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READER’S DIGEST

where the hay is stored, putting tempo- I can see that my interactions with
rary electric fencing around the bales. Comet are changing him. When he
Each day I take a picture of Comet’s sees me coming, his ears perk up. He
wound, but I can’t see any improve- has grown used to the routine. Our
ment, just an ongoing saga of change. interactions have also changed me: I
The wound is its own continent, a land think of him when I’m not there.
formed by an underlying geology of
flesh and muscle. A COUPLE OF TIMES each summer,
Emilie and I will go riding and I’ll ride
EVERY DAY THE WOUND begins to one of her horses, Sally. She’s fine-
scab over and every day I hose the scab boned, quiet but easily spooked. After-
away. It feels a bit counterproductive, ward, Emilie will say that I should
but when I compare the wound to the buy her. But by the end of the day, my

EMBOLDENED BY THE DAY’S RIDE AND

A GLASS OF WINE, I WRITE A CHEQUE TO
PAY FOR SALLY. WHAT HAVE I DONE?

picture I took a few weeks ago, I can see friend will decide she’s not ready to
that the flesh is a lighter pink now, also part with her horse.
pebbled, less oozy though still raw. One morning I wake up to go riding
I have established a routine and the with Emilie. We drive a few kilome-
repetition of my route to Comet has tres north, park on a grassy knoll and
packed down a trail. Walking that path unload the horses. I remain a self-
each morning has given rise to a kind conscious rider—I ride as though I am
of comfort. Wayne will say that in the being watched. And most of the time I
mountains he likes his trails—they am. Emilie analyzes how I am sitting,
reassure him that he’s in the right whether my feet are properly set in
place. Most of the time he is following the stirrups. Like me, the horses know
game routes, but sometimes he makes Emilie is their leader.
his own way. It’s possible that this “Sally likes you,” Emilie says, more
DONNA KANE

changes the habits of moose and cari- adamant than usual. Once again, all
bou and bears, animals that might use through the day she says, “I think you
Wayne’s way instead. need to buy Sally.” And all through the

92 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 Comet (foreground)
with Sally at Kane and
Sawchuk’s home.
READER’S DIGEST

day I consider her suggestion. Comet IT IS LATE SUMMER now. Comet’s

could use a friend, a horse that’s not scabs come off with hardly any bleed-
likely to push him around. Back home ing. I press my hand against the
on the deck, emboldened by the day’s wound. Something about the heat
ride and a glass of wine, we seal the from his body transferring to mine is
deal and I write a cheque. When Emi- soothing. Maybe it’s because I am
lie drives out of the yard, Sally is left touching something that was once
behind in a pen next to Comet. damaged. I am touching something
What have I done? that is nearly healed.
Over the past few weeks I’ve been
AFTER A FEW DAYS of acquainting the turning the garden shed into Sally’s
horses, I put them together in Comet’s tack shed. Comet’s too. I’ve bought my
pen. Almost instantly, Sally’s fawning. own halters for both of them, a caddy,
I’m glad they’ve clicked and the fact brushes and oat dishes. I have been

WHETHER IT IS VISIBLE OR NOT,

A WOUND IS WHAT HAS BEEN TAKEN AWAY,
AN ABSENCE MADE PRESENT BY PAIN.

that Comet has the upper hand was thinking about how to tell Wayne that
necessary to my plan, but I can’t help Comet’s mine.
feeling a little annoyed by Sally’s sub- Whether it is visible or not, a
missiveness. I think again of what wound is what has been taken away,
Wayne says about horses being a reflec- an absence made present by pain: a
tion of the human who owns them. failed marriage, the loss of place, a
Sally doesn’t seem to mind that Comet gash to the flesh. As Comet’s wound
is the boss; she follows Comet around disappears, he needs me less and less.
regardless of how much attention he Healing, it seems, creates its own kind
pays her. of absence.
One afternoon I saddle Sally and ride Today I rode Sally to Emilie’s ranch—
her around in the corral. It goes well, just the two of us. I am beginning to
but I can tell by Sally’s halting move- trust my ability to communicate with a
ments that she’s guessing at what I want. horse and to let the horse communi-
I know I’m not making myself clear. cate with me.

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I TOOK DOWN THE tempo- somewhere else. But if he
rary electric fencing I’d put goes with the other horses,
up around the hay bales in he’ll probably end up being
the area where Comet and a part of Wayne’s herd and
Sally spent their summer. return to the trail.
Comet, Sally, Ronnie and “Okay,” I say, finally.
Bailey have been moved “Let’s try it.”
over to the front pasture. I walk up to Comet and
Fall has arrived—and so stand beside him. I touch
has Wayne. his scar, then put his halter
When Wayne comes on and lead him to the
home, I try to make my fence that separates him
claim: Comet is mine, I’ve Editors’ from the rest of the herd. I
earned him. And he now Choice take off his halter and open
belongs to Sally too. But the gate. He gallops toward
with the other horses back from the the other horses and then they all run
trail, grazing in the harvest field next together across the field.
door, Comet is spending much of his Sally is beside herself, running up
time leaning over the fence whinny- and down the fence line, whinnying.
ing at them. “She’ll be all right,” Wayne says.
“Comet wants to be with the rest of And perhaps she would have been.
the horses,” Wayne keeps saying. “Ron- But it was Comet who, after a few
nie would be better for Sally,” Wayne hours, left the other horses. After a few
says. “He wouldn’t boss her around the days with Comet choosing to graze
way Comet does.” near the fence that separated him and
I feel my resolve start to wane. Also, Sally, Wayne let him back in. At least
I don’t like the idea of Comet staying for the winter they’ll stay together. In
with Sally if what he wants is to be the spring, we will see.
© 2018, DONNA KANE. FROM SUMMER OF THE HORSE, PUBLISHED BY LOST MOOSE, AN IMPRINT OF HARBOUR PUBLISHING,
HARBOURPUBLISHING.COM. ADAPTED AND REPRODUCED BY ARRANGEMENT WITH THE PUBLISHER. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

GOOD GUESS

Weather forecast for tonight: dark. Continued dark overnight,

with widely scattered light by morning.
GEORGE CARLIN

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 95
 GET SMART!

13 Things
You Should
Know About
Planning
a Wedding
BY A N N A- KA I SA WA L K E R
ILLUSTRATION BY CLAYTON HANMER

1 When it comes to a wedding bud-

get, expectations rarely match
reality. While a 2014 BMO poll found
an overnight getaway. To reduce
costs, stay close to home.

that most newly engaged Canadian

couples initially plan to spend an
average of $15,000 on their nuptials,
3 Saturday evening weddings in
June are the most popular, and
consequently often the priciest. Fri-
a 2015 survey by Weddingbells found day evenings are a good alternative,
the average total came out to a whop- giving your guests the whole week-
ping $30,000. end to recover.

2 The biggest budget busters? Bridal

showers and bachelorette parties.
Though it’s customary for brides-
4 The cardinal rule of wedding
budgeting: prioritize. “Pick two
or three things that are most import-
maids to cover the cost, many brides ant,” says Toronto wedding planner
pick up part of the tab, especially on Alicia Seifert. “If that’s an amazing

96 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
photographer and good food, then your wedding date is just a guess-
scale back on the flowers and decor.” timate by your florist. Choose
colours and silhouettes instead.

5 One of the most common mis-

takes is forgetting about clean-up,
says Seifert. Unless it’s included in 10 Almost all wedding fees are,
up to a point, negotiable, says
your venue contract, picking up post- Seifert. “But don’t start your relation-
party is your job. “At the end of the ship to vendors off on the wrong foot
night, your feet will hurt, your friends by lowballing,” she says. “There’s a
will be drunk, and most of your guests vendor for every price range; it’s just
will have left,” Seifert says. Plan ahead, a matter of finding them.”
or risk being hit with a cleaning fee.

6 Consider hiring a wedding plan-

ner—they’re not just for big fancy
11 A no-kids policy is within your
rights—it’s your day, after all—
but give parents a one-on-one explan-
affairs. They’ll keep you on schedule ation of your reasons before invita-
and stay until the end to make sure tions go out (and don’t mention the
the party wraps up smoothly. munchkins’ unruly behaviour). Better
yet, book a group babysitter and give

7 For better or for worse, family

members will weigh in on your
your parent friends a night off.

decisions. Keep the peace with good

communication. “The wedding
industry sells the fallacy that it’s all
12 Planning a destination wed-
ding? A common misconcep-
tion is that food and drink will be free
about the couple, but there’s always at if you book at an all-inclusive resort.
least one family member whose point “Private events always cost extra,”
of view matters,” says Seifert. “Have an says Jennifer Borgh, a Canadian
honest conversation with your part- wedding planner based in Jamaica.
ner about who those people are.” “If you book at an off-site venue,
you’ll get more personalization and

8 As for all other well-meaning

interferers, keep them out of your
won’t be subject to a curfew.”

hair by delegating small tasks, such

as picking up flowers or corralling
family members for photos.
13 Be an ethical host—provide
shuttle buses to and from your
venue so that no one is tempted to
drink and drive. Alternatively, have

9 Don’t get too attached to certain

flowers. What’s affordable around
a stream of taxis waiting at the end
of the reception.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 97
 Brainteasers
Challenge yourself by solving these puzzles and mind stretchers,
then check your answers on page 103.

A SAFE PLACE TO LAND

(Moderately difficult)
There are two types of radar stations in
the field of squares shown. The range
that each type of station can detect is
given below. Which one of the grey or
white squares is not covered at all?

COFFEE ADDICTS (Easy)

Kate and Faizal both believe that they need a cup
(A SA FE PLACE TO LA ND) DARREN RIGBY

of coffee every three hours to stay awake and func-

tion. They each drink their first coffee at 8 a.m. and
another one every three hours thereafter until they
go to sleep. Considering the following facts, who is
spending more on coffee each week?
■ Kate stays up until 10 p.m. Sunday through
Thursday and until midnight on Friday and Sat-
urday. Faizal stays up until 10 p.m. every day.
■ Kate pays $3 per cup of coffee. Faizal drinks
higher-grade organic coffee and pays $4 per cup.

98 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca
 STAR SEARCH (Moderately difficult)
Place stars in seven cells of this grid so
that every row, every column and every
(STA R SEA RCH) FRASER SIM PSON; (M ORE OR LESS) DARREN RIGBY; (BUBBL E MATH) ROD E RICK K IMBAL L OF E NIG AMI. FU N

outlined region contains exactly one

star. Stars must never be located in
adjacent cells, not even diagonally.

MORE OR LESS (Difficult)

Place the hexagons into the pyramid so that
each number is either greater than the sum
of the two numbers below it or less than the
difference between them. (For instance, if
two adjacent numbers were 20 and 50, any
number higher than 70 or lower than 30
could be on top of them.) You may not turn
any numbers upside down.
51 36 28 94
21 32 40 54 76 98

BUBBLE MATH (Difficult)

Assign a whole number 6
between one and five to each
of the 10 bubbles. Each num- 5 4
10
ber occurs twice. The sums
6
of some of the numbers are
8
revealed in the areas where 3 4
their bubbles overlap. Can
you figure out which number
goes in each bubble?

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 99
 That’s Outrageous!
MYSTERIOUS CIRCUMSTANCES
BY NATH ANIE L BAS EN

THE CAT similarly unhelp-

CAME BACK ful; they claim
In November to have neither
2017, surprised flown nor
excavators at shipped the
Dunes Center comestibles.
in Guadalupe, The Adairs have
Calif., unearthed not reported any fur-
something atypical to the area: an ther disturbances and hope to avoid
intact, 136-kilogram sphinx head. any more mystery meat.
The statue wasn’t an ancient original
but an abandoned prop from the LOST AND FOUND
classic 1923 film The Ten Command- Nineteen-year-old Gavin Strickland
ments. The sphinx will likely get a drove from Syracuse, N.Y., to Toronto
second shot at fame when the Dunes last July for a Metallica concert, leav-
Center exhibits part of the remains ing his car in a downtown parking
later this year. garage. It took four days, two nights
on the streets, police assistance and
BUMP IN THE NIGHT an appeal to the Internet before he
Last July, the Adair family, of Florida, saw it again. Strickland, unfamiliar
was awoken by a crash on the roof of with the city, failed to adequately
their house. In the morning, they note his vehicle’s location and
found the culprit lying in their yard: couldn’t find it when the concert
two kilograms of sausage, which had let out. He eventually caught a bus
seemingly rained down from the sky. home, and his parents posted an
PIERRE LORAN GER

An inspection of the roof revealed online ad to crowdsource a search

five more kilograms’ worth of pork- party. After a Toronto woman found
based projectiles but little in the way the car days later, she was rewarded
of answers. A call to the land-clearing $100, plus another $100 for a charity
company identified on the bags was of her choice, for her heroic rescue.

100 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca

 Word Power
Gardening nourishes both body and soul. Dig into this green quiz
and grow your vocabulary.
BY BETH S H ILLIBE ER

1. topiary—A: fragrant and herbal. 9. dibble—A: pointed hand tool

B: flower wreath. C: of shrubs or trees for planting. B: weekend gardener.
clipped into ornamental shapes. C: peat pot for seedlings.

2. variegated—A: native and hardy.

10. cultivar—A: greenhouse.
B: multicoloured. C: wide-spreading.
B: growing season. C: plant variety
3. tilth—A: agricultural suitability evolved by selective breeding.
of tilled soil. B: portion of the harvest
sacrificed to God. C: compost. 11. trellis—A: flower catalogue.
B: walled garden. C: frame to support
4. arboretum—A: structure to pro- climbing plants.
vide shade. B: tree fertilizer. C: tree
garden for educational purposes. 12. tuber—A: underground stem
5. aerate—A: move plants outside. able to reproduce. B: beneficial
B: introduce air into the soil. C: grow garden worm. C: protective shield
with roots in the air. for young plants.

6. symbiotic—A: shaped symmet- 13. inflorescence—A: floral

rically. B: of a close association fragrance. B: blossoming. C: use
between organisms. C: concerning of artificial light to accelerate growth.
the symoblism of flowers.
14. gourd—A: large fruit with a hard
7. scarification—A: cutting of a seed
skin. B: seed bank. C: head gardener
to promote germination. B: bark
of an estate.
regrowth after an injury. C: pruning
to prevent disease.
15. stamen—A: first shoot to break
8. frond—A: unseasonal rain. the soil. B: pollen-producing organ
B: aquatic garden. C: palm or fern leaf. of a flower. C: protective thorn.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 101

READER’S DIGEST

Answers
1. topiary—[C] of shrubs or trees 9. dibble—[A] pointed hand tool
clipped into ornamental shapes; as, for planting; as, Hyun used his dibble
Nadeen grabbed her shears and began to bury his tomato seeds at the
clipping a display of topiary animals. appropriate depth.
2. variegated—[B] multicoloured; 10. cultivar—[C] plant variety evolved
as, The coleuses’ purple and green by selective breeding; as, Practised for
variegated leaves were an eye- at least 5,000 years, rose gardening
catching addition to the garden. has resulted in thousands of cultivars.
3. tilth—[A] agricultural suitability 11. trellis—[C] frame to support
of tilled soil; as, The tilth was just climbing plants; as, Every summer,
right for a vineyard. Antonio watched the sweet-pea vines
grow up the trellis.
4. arboretum—[C] tree garden for
educational purposes; as, On a field 12. tuber—[A] underground stem
trip to the arboretum, Mrs. LeDuc able to reproduce; as, A potato is
explained the differences between a tuber and, if left in the soil, could
coniferous and deciduous trees. sprout new plants.

5. aerate—[B] introduce air into the 13. inflorescence—[B] blossoming;

soil; as, Guessing that her lawn needed as, In designing her garden, Lydia
more oxygen, Riya set out to aerate it took inflorescence timing into
by poking holes in the ground. account, ensuring that at least one
species would be flowering at any
6. symbiotic—[B] of a close associa- given moment.
tion between organisms; as, Many
fungi have a symbiotic relationship 14. gourd—[A] large fruit with a hard
with tree roots, helping them to skin; as, Gourds can be dried and
extract nutrients from the soil. fashioned into cups, utensils or even
musical instruments.
7. scarification—[A] cutting of a seed
to promote germination; as, Walnuts 15. stamen—[B] pollen-producing
may benefit from scarification so that organ of a flower; as, Pollen clung to
water can penetrate them. the bee as it climbed over the stamen.

8. frond—[C] palm or fern leaf; as,

VOCABULARY RATINGS
Leatherleaf fern fronds are often used 7–10: fair
in floral arrangements because they 11–12: good
stay fresh for a long time. 13–15: excellent

102 | 05 • 2018 | rd.ca

 Brainteasers:
Answers
(from page 98) Sudoku
A SAFE PLACE TO LAND BY IAN RIE N SCHE

6 9 8 1 2
The white square in the 1 8 3 4
middle of the third row
from the top. 3
COFFEE ADDICTS
FAIZAL. He spends $140
3 7 5 6
per week while Kate
spends $111. 4 6 1 3
STAR SEARCH 7 3 8 1
7
2 1 8 7
4 7 1 2 5
MORE OR LESS
TO SOLVE THIS PUZZLE…
54
You have to put a number from
21 32
1 to 9 in each square so that:
98 76 40
(S UDOKU) SUDOKUP UZZLER.COM

51 36 28 94 ■ every horizontal row SOLUTION

9 5 2 3 1 8 7 4 6
and vertical column 7 8 6 4 5 9 3 1 2
BUBBLE MATH contains all nine numerals 1 4 3 6 7 2 5 9 8
4 6 2 3 (1-9) without repeating 2 1 9 8 4 3 6 7 5
5
any of them;
3 7 5 1 9 6 8 2 4
4
10
1 5 1 6 5
8 6 4 5 2 7 1 3 9
8
3 4 ■ each of the 3 x 3 boxes 6 9 8 2 3 1 4 5 7
2 4 3
has all nine numerals,
4 3 7 9 6 5 2 8 1
5 2 1 7 8 4 9 6 3
none repeated.

rd.ca | 05 • 2018 | 103

 Quotes
BY C H RISTINA PALASS IO

I’ve never really felt

EXPLORATION IS that I belong where I
NOT SOMETHING am. But isn’t that how
writers are supposed
YOU RETIRE FROM. to feel? Aren’t we
IT IS A PART OF supposed to feel both
microscopic and
ONE’S LIFE ETHIC. telescopic?
R O B E R TA B O N DA R J O H N I RVI N G

WE CAN’T DREAM
OUR WAY OUT
OF OPPRESSION.
DAV I D C H A R I A N DY

Running is a great way to multi-task. You can get in a workout,

but you can also help clear your mind. B R E N DA N B R A Z I E R

I’VE Really, the best way

ALWAYS to celebrate 25 years
HAD of being in a band is
COMEDY to start another year
IN ME. of being in a band.
C ATH Y J O N E S E D R O B E R T SO N

PHOTOS: (BONDAR) THE ROBERTA BONDAR FOUNDATION; (CHARIANDY) JOY VAN TIEDEMANN;
(JONES) RILEY SMITH/CBC MEDIA CENTRE. QUOTES: (BONDAR) CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC (MAY 2,
2017); (IRVING) CBC RADIO’S THE NEXT CHAPTER (DEC. 14, 2015); (CHARIANDY) NOW MAGAZINE
(SEPT. 26, 2017); (BRAZIER) THE GLOBE AND MAIL (DEC. 20, 2017); (JONES) VANCOUVERPRESENTS.
COM (SEPT. 20, 2016); (ROBERTSON) CBC MUSIC (JULY 28, 2017).
 “Does your bladder leak
underwear fit this beautifully?”

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