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Are we leaving because we have to? No. Although in my college days I had the uncanny knack of getting my picture in the newspaper every time I attended a protest rally, I do not really think I'm being watched. I do sometimes wonder if Allan is on some kind of watch list, given his 9/11 research . If he is... No fair! I want on it, too! (Who was it that was always annoyed he didn't make Nixon's Enemy List?) I've always had activist friends who wouldn't mention certain subjects on the phone and such. I always thought, Don't flatter yourself. I don't think the government gives a poop about me one way or the other. I do, however, keep this wonderful cartoon prominently displayed near my monitor.

Am I leaving to do abortion-access activism in Canada? People have asked if I'm moving to Canada in order to begin a Canadian outpost of the Haven Coalition. Alas, I can only wish I was so dedicated to any movement, that I would uproot my life for the cause. That said, if the election goes the wrong way and the religious right continues their takeover of American laws, it's conceivable that Haven's work could become illegal. We are fond of calling Haven an underground railroad of sorts, which it is. But Haven could, theoretically, become a real underground railroad, illegally smuggling women into Canada for abortions, just as British women have done for their Irish sisters for decades. Whether or not it would... who knows. Let's do everything in our power to make sure we never have to find out. Right now, Haven does serve some Canadian women. In a concession to the Catholic Church, the province of Quebec (which has separate laws from the rest of Canada) has stricter a

We are in the midst of an ongoing clean-out, throw-away, sell-it project. Allan is a pack-rat of the first order -- a collector, an accumulator, a saver. I am a minimalist. I do save some things, but I am always paring down. I like  s  p  a  c  e.  It's always been a juggling act: he can't save absolutely everything he would like to, and I can't have as much empty space as I would like. Mostly we've been pretty good at it, though I suspect we each feel we've compromised more than the other. Now, with our impending move, even my favorite pack-rat knows he has to get rid of lots of stuff. First of all, you pay for moving by the pound. Beyond that, why move with stuff that's been sitting in boxes, untouched and un-looked at, for years, only to have it sit in the same box in a different (Canadian) closet? I started the process early, knowing it was the only way. He's got boxes and boxes and boxes (etc. etc.) to go through. If we wait til the last minute, it will

I'm going to make this a recurrent entry. I love to talk about books. If everyone weren't so shy about leaving comments, emailing me instead, we could discuss books together! So the first What I'm Reading entry is The Power Broker : Robert Moses and the Fall of New York, by Robert Caro . This book, which won the Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction in 1975, is always talked about in the most superlative terms. People just do cartwheels over it, calling it one of the greatest books ever written about New York City, power and politics, and one of the great biographies of all time. I am here to tell you that the praise is completely deserved. It is absolutely masterful. Anyone who is interested in cities or New York City history - for that matter, in American history - would love it. And Robert Moses himself! If he hadn't lived, no one could have invented him: he simply would have been too incredible for fiction. Moses, an evil genius if ever there was one, was surely one of the

I'm finally reading The Power Broker , Robert Caro's masterpiece about Robert Moses and New York City. It's been on my to-read list forever, and it seemed like a good thing to tackle while I still live here. Reading it on the subway this morning, I came across a passage that is perfectly applicable to our present times - so much so, that I'm surprised I haven't seen it before from the ACLU or a Constitution-loving writer. (Of course it may have been used many times, I just never came across it.) Caro refers to Robert Bolt's play A Man For All Seasons : In A Man For All Seasons , Sir Thomas More warns young Roper about the consequences of letting ends justify means. When the young man says he would "cut down every law in England" to "get after the Devil," More replies: "Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you -- where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat?" That says it all, doesn't it? With

Haven!! The Haven Coalition coordinating committee had an important, long-planned meeting last night. Our organization has grown exponentially in the last year, and so has our bond to each other, our enjoyment of working together, our feelings of strength and pride in our accomplishments. Also our anger that our work is so necessary! Haven is one of the hardest things about leaving New York. It's more than the time and energy I've invested, though that is very significant. It's the friends I've made, the deep connections I feel to the women who do this work. For those of you who don't know, Haven is a volunteer network that assists women who travel to New York City for second trimester abortions. Abortion, though still legal, is inaccessible to millions of American women. Women motivated and determined enough to travel to New York City, usually with very limited resources, then face the daunting prospect of having to stay overnight for a two-day procedure. Haven

Philadelphia, PA, July 6-9, 2004 I had wanted us to go to Philadelphia with Allan for years, to see Penn and do some sightseeing in the city. I had never been back to do that. A few years earlier, we took a bus to Philadelphia for a rally in support of Mumia Abu-Jamal. (Allan had a terrible experience on the bus.) We left the rally at City Hall, and walked over to 1221 Walnut Street. The building was different, but the doorway and address were there. "There it is," I said. "The scene of the crime." We stood and looked at it, I shed a tear, and when we walked away, I felt better. I had gotten past on obstacle I didn't even realize I had. After that, I planned to go, but we just never did. There was always someplace better to go. When the National Constitution Center opened, I read about it, it sounded great, and then the Phillies got a new ballpark. Finally, once we decided to leave NYC, I knew if we didn't go to Philadelphia before we left, we never would. W

the sunday new york times!!!                                   + + + + What am I going to do without the Sunday Times ?? It doesn't matter that I can get articles online. This isn't about reading an article here and there. This is more like an addiction, a compulsion. Sometimes a tyranny. I can be oppressed by my own habits. It's one thing to go on vacation and skip a week or two - I do that purposely, I refuse to do otherwise. But not reading the New York Times Magazine and Book Review (almost) every week? What will I do? You probably think I'm joking. I'm only half-joking. I am a little bit compulsive. This is one of those things. I do like the Globe and Mail . And I'll have more time for all those Harper's articles Allan always wants me to read. But, but...                                    + + + + Tonight we are going to the New York Philharmonic (free) concert in Central Park, picnicking with a niece and two nephews. My last one of these, I imagine.

Blogger.com is a free service, and a small ad runs at the top of the screen. Though I am hugely ad-phobic, this one is fairly innocuous. It is small, the colors blend in, it doesn't pop up or move across the screen, and it only advertises google searches. But apparently the content of those google searches are taken from keywords in the blog posts. Until I post something new, the ad is offering searches for national anthems! Isn't that ironic, given my feelings about those silly songs?

In Philadelphia last week, we met a great couple who own a funky political/alternative bookstore just off the Penn campus. Like almost everyone else we speak to about the move, they professed interest in moving to Canada, too. According to what I've read, if they want to start a business (in their case, a bookstore) in Canada - and especially, if they choose a non-urban area - Canadian Immigration will welcome them with open arms.   Allan and I are applying for residence under "skilled worker" status, but another way to go is as a business owner or entrepreneur. Under that status, you have to show proof of having run a business in your home country, you need a lot of money with which to start a business, and you have to promise to hire at least one Canadian full-time within a year after moving. That's it.   As far as I can tell, they are really encouraging people to open businesses in Canada, especially in less populated areas, which is basically everywhere except To

I had lunch with my mom yesterday. This is the really tough part. I know I'll still see everyone I care about. But how often? And for what kind of visit?   My mother and I are spoiled; we don't have the long-distance phone calls and planned visits that most families do. We live so nearby, we can meet just for coffee or lunch, for a few hours, without a lot of advance planning. Once I move, we'll see each other less often, but for longer periods of time. I don't know what that will be like.   If I think about missing my mother and my sister, I get so upset, I think, Why am I doing this? I don't want to live in this one place all my life, regardless of where I'm going. And I know I'm ready to move. But still, this is the bad part. 

I got some nice email from a man who left the US as a Vietnam draft resister. (He's actually the father of someone I work with in the Haven Coalition. Way to feel old!) He says: There's a tradition here that any band with any kind of sense of humour offers up their ideas for a new Canadian national anthem. There's a very funny group called The Arrogant Worms whose potential Canadian  anthem includes the line "I know that we're no better, but I'm sure that we're less worse". Googling The Arrogant Worms , I discovered lots of cool stuff, including these lyrics, from "Canada's Really Big": When I look around me I can't believe what i see it seems as if this country has lost its will to live the economy is lousy we barely have an army but we can still stand proudly because Canada's really big   We're the second largest country on this planet earth and if Russia keeps on shrinking, then soon we'll be first! (As long as we keep

Ride with him and sooner or later you will hear him say it: I used to live there. His finger jabs as if to poke a hole into the night. I used to live there. On Broadway and Fulton and Riverside and Houston he is so goddamned irritating, can't keep his mouth shut. In crowded movie theatres when it turns out the location scout knows where to get the best fifty-cent hot dog. On long walks, while flipping through random books of photography, while flying overhead on jet planes: I used to live there. When they least expect it he will say it, apropos of nothing he will say it, because if he hasn't lived there, he will someday. There are always other apartments waiting for him. There is always more city. Colson Whitehead, 2003 If that doesn't describe the quintessential New Yorker, I don't know what does. This essay collection is fabulous. The first piece was originally published in the New York Times Magazine in a special issue shortly after September 11th. I read it two mon

New York is an ugly city, a dirty city. Its climate is a scandal, its politics are used to frighten children, its traffic is madness, its competition is murderous. But there is one thing about it -- once you have lived in New York and it has become your home, no place else is good enough. All of everything is concentrated here -- population, theatre, art, writing, publishing, importing, business, murder, mugging, luxury, poverty. It is all of everything. It goes all right. It is tireless and its air is charged with energy. John Steinbeck, 1953 Steinbeck is a writing hero of mine. Mass hysteria is a terrible force, yet New Yorkers seem always to escape it by some tiny margin: they sit in stalled subways with claustrophobia, they extricate themselves from panic situations by some lucky wisecrack, they meet confusion and congestion with patience and grit -- a sort of perpetual muddling through. Every facility is inadequate -- the hospitals and schools and playgrounds are overcrowded, th

Some Canadians have written with feedback on my "what I won't miss" list . They are concerned that my expectations may be too high; they want to warn me that some items on my list "will not necessarily disappear on crossing the border". Duly noted, and I thank you. I certainly want to proceed with both eyes open. Three things - "republicans, democrats, where my taxes go" - seem to be the sticking point, so I will expound. Where my taxes go: When I think about the war - about the tens of thousands of Iraqi families (we will never know how many; that's American, too) who are dead, or grieving, or whose lives have been reduced to rubble, for absolutely no reason except someone else's power and profit - and I think about the hundreds and hundreds of American families who are forever without their son, daughter, husband, mother, brother, sister - and the thousands more coping with amputations, blindness, trauma, despair - when I think of all this, i

After reading the story so far, a friend had the impression we are moving very soon, maybe before the year is out. We'll actually be here longer than that. Here's how it works. Our applications are in a queue waiting to be assessed; right now that queue is 8 months long. (That time frame could decrease or increase at any time.) When our applications come up for assessment, we'll receive notification of that. Then we will drink champagne. After that... We'll have to get physicals, they'll run an FBI check to make sure we are not felons (note to self: do not get arrested at anti-RNC demos this summer), they may want to interview us, and they may contact people in our lives to inquire about us. (Please be kind.) This whole process could take a while, too. A semi-interesting side note. In the US, the official medical exam for Canadian Immigration can only be done by three designated doctors - one in NYC, one in Chicago and one in L.A. If we didn't live in one of tho

I am keenly aware that this is my last year in New York. I've written an essay about this, but since I'm trying to get it published (by someone other than me), you'll have to wait to read it. Combing through some old computer files recently, I came across a "New York City to-do list" I drew up about 10 years back, compiled from articles and listings I would come across. I was pleasantly surprised to see how many of them we had covered: the Morris Jumel Mansion , the Dyckman House , the scale model city in the Queens Museum. The Russian shops in Brighton Beach, an ancient pizzeria somewhere on the D line. (Note to self: eat at DiFara again before leaving.) A few holdouts remain. This year, I have to get to the Merchant House Museum, the New York City Fire Museum, and the two sculpture parks in Long Island City. (Seeing the opening dates for those, I understood why they have eluded us: April to October. Baseball season.) There are beautiful new mosaics in many

what i'll miss. the haven coalition yankee stadium marching on washington what i won't miss. schlepping around new york with packages. that is, doing errands without a car. ed koch george steinbrenner

We got some estimates on the move: it's going to cost about $6,000, which includes a one-way car rental for us and the dogs. (Yes, we're driving up to Canada with two dogs and an air mattress...) So the approximately $2,500 for the applications is checked off. We'll soon have our "proof of funds" plus moving expenses. Next comes first month's rent on an apartment, plus we'll need a car. I never thought I'd have this much money. That might sound funny to some who have always been comfortable or have always had a decent income. But the things I've chosen to do with my life don't make one rich, and I struggled financially for a long time. (No regrets, and thank you corporate law firms!) I never, ever imagined I'd be able to afford something like this. Every once in a while, I look at the balance in the Canada Fund and think, that's Macchu Picchu. That's Egypt. That's my trip to New Zealand. Allan reminds me that we never thought

Not everyone is supportive; some people seem offended by the idea of our moving. I don't mean right-wing wahoos - I haven't told any of those. I mean some fairly liberal minded people have seemed offended. What's up with that? Do they feel I am somehow rejecting them? The people we met in Canada seemed to get it right away. When they hear you are American and moving up there, they just nod knowingly and say, Good for you. It seemed like an unspoken code.

suburbia. never traveling again. having to work full-time forever. never traveling again, because we can't afford it, or don't have dog-care, or all our vacations are taken up with visiting family and friends. Allan pointed out that I wrote "never traveling again" twice. I must be really scared of that one!

what i'll miss. being paid large sums of money to read the newspaper and listen to yankee games. my work/writing/life schedule. the chrysler building, the woolworth building, the flatiron building, grand central terminal, the brooklyn bridge – in other words, the grandeur of new york. no architecture where we’re going. seeing the development of ground zero. having lunch with my mother. being a new yorker. what i won't miss. chips bags and beer bottles and mcdonald’s bags in the street, plastic bags in trees. litter drives me insane. fingernail clipping on the subway. republicans democrats where my tax dollars go

I love the apartments we saw in Meadowvale. I mean I really love them. They are huge, comfortable, beautiful. They are much larger and much nicer than anything we could afford in the city, at least anything we could find right now. Space has always been important to us, and since we'll be working full-time (at least for a time), comfort will be more important than ever. These suburbs are as diverse as any city I've ever been in, and goodness knows I am ready to trade in the car-less life for one of greater convenience and big-box stores. (My favorite thing about traveling outside of NYC are the supermarkets!) But in these suburbs, there is nothing . I mean nothing. It is the epitome of sprawl: just places to live and places to shop, and nothing else. There is no main street, no urban village. No cafes, no street life, no community. Just malls. And they are far out from Toronto. In order to get this kind of space at a rent we can afford, we have to be far from the city. So we t

We're moving to a city we've never been to before! But then, immigrants have been doing that for centuries. At least, thanks to modern communications, we're not imagining the streets are paved with gold. We went to Toronto for 4 days in April. You can fly from NY to Buffalo very cheaply on JetBlue , and since we would need a car anyway, that's what we did. Buffalo is a little farther from Toronto than advertised, but hey, it worked. I got a great deal at a hotel two steps from downtown and a short subway ride from the Skydome. Of course the trip was timed to coincide with one of our teams being in town, and it happened to be the Red Sox. We met in person a few people I knew online, saw two baseball games (Sox won both), looked at apartments and a few neighborhoods, and met with two legal staffing agencies. The people. Now we know some people in the area! Two really great women and the male partner of one of the women. Their politics are just like ours, so we are immed

By this time, almost everyone in our lives knows about our impending BLC. Everyone has been extremely supportive - including my mom, for whom this is unwelcome news. It's no surprise that my mother is supportive, she's never been anything but. But she wants all her children within easy driving distance; that's very important to her. (And I think that has kept me here longer than I might have otherwise been.) So it's damn big of her to be on my side even when it runs counter to her own wishes. Old friends are shocked that we are leaving New York; apparently my identity as the Last Diehard New Yorker is well established. A very close friend told me she imagined us as old ladies together, having dinner at an Upper West Side coffee shop. That surely brings a lump to my throat. The most common reaction has been, "We've talked about doing that, too," or words to that effect. At least one gay couple we know may be following us over the border, and my brother is t

It seemed like we toiled over those applications for months. In reality, much of that time was spent waiting - for our passports, for my birth certificate, for Uncle David's documents. Then a document would arrive, we would get back to work on the forms - only to discover we needed some additional document. We were under the impression that the forms wouldn't be reviewed for a long time - maybe nine months, maybe a year - and then, if anything was incorrect or incomplete, the applications would be kicked out, and we'd have to start all over. This made the whole thing a little stressful, as we felt everything had to be done perfectly - though the instructions were not always perfectly clear. As it turns out, our information about the process wasn't completely accurate. No surprise, it came from the immigration law firm, trying to sell their services. But finally... On March 22, 2004 , we assembled all the pieces, including two cashier's "cheques" for $1,115

Round about this time, I am kicking myself for depositing our writing income in long-term accounts. At the time, I thought it was the smart thing to do, to guard against spending. But now we could be filling out our applications, if only we had our "proof of funds". Except $6,000 of the necessary $10,000 is tied up in stupid long-term savings accounts (that earn next to nothing in interest anyway). Since there is still a good 8 or 9 month queue of applications waiting to be assessed, we are anxious to get ours in. Bah. An annoying delay. The answer to this obstacle arrived in the mail, in the form of one of those ubiquitous credit-card offers. An account that we no longer use was offering a 0% interest cash advance . For a small fee, we could get the balance we needed into our "canada fund", thereby showing the correct proof of funds at the time of application. Then, while our applications are in the queue, we can pay off the cash advance before any interest kicks i

Winter 2003 . I found a website of a Canadian immigration law firm that offered a free assessment. They claim to have a 100% success rate - meaning, they only represent people that they know they can get accepted. Canadian Immigration does not require representation - in fact, it is purposely set up so you can do it yourself - but if you are borderline, having an immigration lawyer could be a good idea. At the very least, I thought, we can fill out their application and see whether or not they offer us representation. That will tell us something one way or the other. I filled out their form. Then three things happened. One, the Canadian law firm sent us an application for representation and a fee schedule. Two, the backlog of applications waiting for immigration shrank from 19 months to 9 months. And three... (drumroll, please) the passmark was lowered from 75 points to 67 points!! In response to a large influx of people applying to emigrate who were borderline, the country lowered th

Right off the bat, I learned that Canada is one of the few countries in the world still actively encouraging immigration. I learned we would be applying for Permanent Resident status, which would give us full rights and responsibilities, with the exception of voting, since we would not be Canadian citizens. And I learned that there's no quarantine period for dogs. All we need is proof of rabies vaccine and the pups can cross the border with us. Two things led us to believe that emigration would take a very long time, possibly several years. (Allan nearly refused to believe this. He would grumble and flatly deny it every time I mentioned it.) One, we would need to show "proof of funds" - a certain amount of money in the bank, over and above whatever we needed to move and get an apartment, in case we didn't find immediate employment. This meant we couldn't even submit our application until we had $10,000 in the bank. And two, there was a very lengthy waiting list.

I wish I knew the exact date of that very first conversation. But who can ever know what casual words will later take on great meaning as the ones that Changed Our Life? So unfortunately, I don't know exactly when this happened. But by piecing things together, I think the conversation must have been in July 2003 - that is, one year ago. Wow, we have moved quickly! (That is typical of me once I make a decision that feels right.) The talk. We were in the living room, watching the news. I don't know if it was the latest phony terror warning, or some new attack on basic freedoms , or the latest international embarrassment - I really can't say. But something made me sigh and repeat the old refrain of the American left: "Maybe we should move to Canada." And Allan said, "Can we? I mean, could we? If we wanted to?" He said he had been thinking about it for a while (and I believe he had mentioned it casually, too): that if Moron was "re"elected, we sho

Why Canada. National health insurance, legal gay marriage, no death penalty, full abortion rights, less crime, less poverty. Canada didn't support the invasion of Iraq, and they don't keep a huge military with which to bully the rest of the world. Religious fanatics do not control the government. It's not a socialist utopia, but it all adds up to a very different attitude about government, society and a nation's place in the world. In short, it's a country with values more similar to my own. The US has moved so far to the right. It's not just the W Regime, even though they've made it so much worse. It's been going this way for almost 25 years. Relative to the norm in this country, I used to be a liberal. Now I'm a radical leftist - and I haven't changed at all! Why Toronto. It's extremely diverse. There are jobs in our field. It's English-speaking. It's a big enough city that we won't be bored. It's close enough to NYC for f

Maybe I should start with what this is not. This is not a "what I did today" blog. This is not a personal website with links to my writing, causes, favorite sites. That is tempting, but concerns about creating a giant time-sucking machine have kept me from going that route. I'm not intending to link to other bloggers, facts about Canada or information on how to emigrate, at least not now. This is meant to be a chronicle of the latest chapter in our ongoing adventure (that is, our lives): our move to Canada. It's a way of processing the overwhelming change I'll be experiencing, and a way of posting our news to anyone who's interested. But being the storyteller that I am, I need to backtrack to the beginning of the journey.