the clock is winding down on 2018. I have some exciting ~personal news~ to announce about what I'm going to be doing in 2019, but that will wait until next week.
in the meantime, this seems like a good occasion to revisit some of the things that I wrote this year. thread!
in the meantime, this seems like a good occasion to revisit some of the things that I wrote this year. thread!
let's go big picture/national first. last january i wrote about discovering the joys of gardening amid a seasonal depression. it was a good hobby to cultivate this year. also, someday i will get "horny for horticulture" on a t shirt vice.com/en_ca/article/…
botany was also on the brain when i this short speculative piece on how a journalism "bailout" might work. (for the record, i don't think "tax credits for donations to Accredited outlets" means the end of press freedom. nor does it mean a solution, tho.) vice.com/en_ca/article/…
after the toronto van attack, i wrote about how 'toxic masculinity' is both real & bad. (the words 'toxic masculinity' becoming a lazy punchline for lots of twitter users this year was good, as it easily identified them as dumbasses not to take seriously) vice.com/en_ca/article/…
haha i was wrong to think at the time that the "darkest timeline" of nationalizing the transmountain pipeline was unlikely, but i still stand by the position that there is probably no happy outcome for Trudeau as far as pipeline politics go vice.com/en_ca/article/…
wrote this when they first started imprisoning children at the border. candace malcolm called me hysterical at the time, but i understand that she was since eaten by a bear she tried to shoot with a watergun or something. my condolences to her family vice.com/en_ca/article/…
as the CPC leads us into another round of inflammatory bullshit about immigration (specifically, the violently stupid misrepresentations of what UN compacts are), it's worth remembering that, unfortunately, this is probably the future of our politics vice.com/en_ca/article/…
this interview was probably the highlight of my year, no joke. please watch "What Is Democracy?" whenever you get the chance. astra taylor is a genuine treasure vice.com/en_ca/article/…
the not-very-subtle homophobia of alberta's united conservative party prompted me to write this for the guardian back in may. the party still hates queer people. tell jason kenney to go fuck himself when you go to the polls in a few months (!!!) theguardian.com/world/2018/may…
speaking of homophobia, a number of newfoundland towns made headlines this year because queer kids make religious fundamentalists uncomfortable. which got me thinking about how NL is ripe for the right-wing politics of rage currently sweeping the continent vice.com/en_ca/article/…
haha nothing like a trip back through a year's worth of political writing to remind me that 2018 was a fucking mess. luckily not everything i wrote was a dispatch from the depths of depression. writing as an ambiguously ironic amateur astrologer was fun! theovercast.ca/god-guard-thee…
(honestly though: that the piece doesn't include rising signs in its analysis is a major oversight.......... i promise my future astrology readings will be much more theoretically rigorous)
i also got to write about resurrecting the Great Auk, a very lovable bird who met a very unfortunate end. maybe the best pure writing piece i did this year. nqonline.ca/article/resurr…
last but not least:
i spent a lot of time this year thinking about the future prospects of this rock where i was born and raised. i came back to live and work here because i dearly love this place. but doom is always in the air. hence this, last january: vice.com/en_ca/article/…
i spent a lot of time this year thinking about the future prospects of this rock where i was born and raised. i came back to live and work here because i dearly love this place. but doom is always in the air. hence this, last january: vice.com/en_ca/article/…
i wrote that as a way of getting my anxieties straight before getting together with other young newfoundlanders to talk all this stuff out.
those conversations became this piece for The Deep, and putting it together helped me regain faith in our future.
thedeepmag.ca/therockinahard…
those conversations became this piece for The Deep, and putting it together helped me regain faith in our future.
thedeepmag.ca/therockinahard…
whew. thanks for indulging me in this Freelancers' Retrospective. in february it'll be 4 years since i first started writing nationally w/ Vice. still regularly awed by the privilege of writing for a living. i love everyone who has supported me along the way. it means the world.
